40年後 對美國遣返的兒子說聲對不起

YEONGJU, South Korea — Kwon Pil-ju is trying desperately to teach herself English before she is reunited in the coming weeks with a son she sent away almost 40 years ago.

韓國榮州——權碧主（Kwon Pil-ju，音）在拼命地自學英語，因爲幾周後，她要與近40年前送走的兒子團聚。

“I have so much to tell him, especially how sorry I am,” she said, sitting in her bedroom, which doubles as her kitchen, in her one-floor rural home in Yeongju. “But I am at a loss, because I don’t know English and he can’t speak Korean.”

“我有很多話要對他說，尤其是我多麼對不起他，”她坐在榮州一所一層農舍的臥室兼廚房裏說。“但我不知道該怎麼說，因爲我不懂英語，他又不會說韓語。”

Her son is Adam Crapser, 41, a Korean adoptee who is awaiting deportation from an immigration detention center in Washington State because he lacks American citizenship, even though he has lived in the United States since he was 3 years old. Last month, an immigration court denied his final request to stay in the United States.

她的兒子是41歲的亞當•克拉普塞爾(Adam Crapser)。他是一名被收養的韓國人，現在正在華盛頓州一家移民拘留中心等待被驅逐出境。儘管他從3歲起就生活在美國，他卻沒有美國公民身份。上月，一個移民法庭拒絕了他留在美國的最後一次申請。

Until Mr. Crapser’s fate was reported in a documentary broadcast by South Korea’s MBC-TV last year, Ms. Kwon did not even know that the son she gave up in 1978 had been in the United States.

在去年韓國MBC-TV電視臺的一部紀錄片報道克拉普塞爾的命運之前，權女士甚至不知道自己1978年放棄的兒子在美國。

As it turned out, the boy she called Shin Song-hyuk was one of 200,000 South Korean children sent abroad for adoption since the end of the Korean War, most of them to the United States.

事實上，被她稱爲申頌赫（Shin Song-hyuk，音）的男孩是朝鮮戰爭結束後被送出國收養的20萬韓國兒童之一，其中大多數被送往美國。

South Koreans have lamented their country’s international reputation as a leading baby exporter. But in a society that held deep prejudices against single mothers and children born outside marriage, and that shunned domestic adoptions, sending children abroad was often the best option for poor South Korean women. Adoption agencies solicited their babies, promising better lives abroad.

韓國人一直哀嘆於自己國家作爲主要嬰兒輸出國的國際聲譽。但是，韓國社會對單親媽媽和私生子存在深刻偏見，而且排斥國內收養，所以對貧窮的韓國女性來說，把孩子送往國外收養往往是最佳選擇。收養機構招攬她們的嬰兒，並向她們承諾，孩子會在國外過上更好的生活。

In recent years, however, some have returned to South Korea as adults, reporting adoptions gone wrong.

但是，近些年，有些人在成年後返回韓國，稱收養出了問題。

Some of the most wrenching stories have come from those who were deported back to South Korea. Like Mr. Crapser, they were abused or abandoned by their adoptive parents. Only after they ran afoul of the law did they learn that they were not American citizens, their parents having never filed citizenship paperwork for them.

其中最悲慘的故事來自那些被遣返回韓國的人。和克拉普塞爾一樣，他們受到養父母的虐待或被拋棄。他們只有在違法後才知道自己不是美國公民，養父母從未給他們辦理入籍手續。

Officials at South Korea’s Ministry of Health and Welfare say they know of at least five adoptees who were deported back from the United States. But advocates for Korean adoptees say there may be more than twice as many, some undocumented.

韓國保健福祉部(Ministry of Health and Welfare )的官員稱，他們知道至少有五名被收養者被從美國遣返回來。但是，韓國收養兒權益的倡導者稱，實際人數可能是這個數字的兩倍多，有些人沒被記錄在案。

Tossed back to a country they had left decades ago, these adoptees were once again foreigners struggling to adapt to an unfamiliar culture and language.

被趕回數十年前離開的國家後，這些被收養者再次成爲努力適應不熟悉的文化和語言的外國人。

The television documentary that reported Mr. Crapser’s plight also included the story of a 44-year-old adoptee named Monte Haines, or Han Ho-kyu, who served in the United States military in the 1990s. He was deported to South Korea in 2009 after he was caught driving a truck carrying illegal drugs. Some adoptees had severe mental illnesses and became homeless when they returned to a country that was never truly their home.

那部記錄克拉普塞爾遭遇的電視紀錄片還提到一個名爲蒙特•海恩斯(Monte Haines)或韓浩奎（Han Ho-kyu，音）的44歲被收養者的故事。他曾在20世紀90年代在美國軍中服役。2009年，他開着一輛裝有非法毒品的卡車被抓後，被遣返回韓國。有些被收養者患有嚴重的精神疾病，回到這個從未真正是其家鄉的國家之後，變得無家可歸。

At least Mr. Crapser has a birth mother waiting for him.

至少，克拉普塞爾還有個生母在等他。

Ms. Kwon, 61, spends hours filling ruled pages with the letters of the English alphabet, copied down in a shaky hand. It’s slow going for a woman with no formal education, but she wants to be able to explain herself to her son.

61歲的權女士花費數小時整理那些橫格紙，上面有她用顫抖的手抄寫的英文字母。對一個從未受過正規教育的女性來說，進展非常緩慢，但她希望自己能夠向兒子表達自己的想法。

“I have never imagined that he was having this hard life of his,” she said, wiping away tears. “I should have kept him even if we starved together. What I did was an unforgivable sin.”

“我從沒想到，他的生活這麼艱辛，”她擦去眼淚說，“我應該把他留在身邊，哪怕我們一起捱餓。我做的孽不可饒恕。”

When she was a child, Ms. Kwon received acupuncture therapy that went horribly wrong, leaving her left leg shriveled and paralyzed. Her alcoholic father sent her to live with a man with cerebral palsy. A year and a half later, she met a carpenter with whom she had three children: a daughter and two sons, including a boy born in 1975, Shin Song-hyuk, who would become Adam Crapser.

權女士小時候接受鍼灸治療時出現嚴重問題，左腿萎縮、癱瘓。酒鬼父親把她送去跟一個腦癱男人生活。一年半後，她遇見一個木匠，跟他生了三個孩子：一個女兒和兩個兒子，包括1975年出生的申頌赫，也就是後來的亞當•克拉普塞爾。

The carpenter often kicked and punched Ms. Kwon, she said, and he eventually abandoned her and her young children.

她說，那個木匠經常對她拳打腳踢，最後拋棄了她和年幼的孩子們。

Ms. Kwon could not pay her rent. Her father was too poor to take her and her children in.

當時她付不起房租。她的父親又太窮，不肯收留她和孩子們。

In 1978, she gave her youngest son to a childless family. She took her daughter and Song-hyuk, then 3, to a local orphanage that arranged adoptions. She saw her children playing with toys and other children, and left without saying goodbye for fear they would follow her.

1978年，她把最小的兒子送給一個沒有孩子的家庭。她把女兒和當時3歲的頌赫送到當地一家安排收養的孤兒院。她看見孩子們玩玩具，和其他孩子一起玩。因爲擔心他們會跟着她，她沒跟孩子們告別就離開了。

Last year, Ms. Kwon got a call from a relative who remembered Song-hyuk and had watched the television documentary. In it, Mr. Crapser called out for his birth mother.

去年，她接到一個親戚的電話，那個親戚還記得頌赫，而且看到了那部電視紀錄片。克拉普塞爾在片中向生母求助。

“Remember, Eomma, I am always your son, your flesh and blood,” he said, using the Korean word for mom.

“記住，Eomma，我永遠是你的兒子，是你的血肉，”他說，用韓語發音來稱呼媽媽。

Ms. Kwon contacted the documentary’s producer, Kim Bo-seul, who arranged a video chat between the mother and son, and a DNA test to confirm their relationship.

權女士聯繫了那部紀錄片的製作人金寶雪（Kim Bo-seul，音），後者安排這對母子進行視頻通話，並進行DNA檢測，以確定他們的母子關係。

Mr. Crapser, who has a wife, a daughter and two stepdaughters, communicated with his biological mother through an interpreter. He expects to be deported in the coming weeks and will reunite with his mother, who plans to decorate a small room in her house for her son.

克拉普塞爾有個妻子、一個女兒和兩名繼女，他通過翻譯與生母交談。幾周後，他會被遣返回國，與母親團聚，後者計劃在自己的房子裏給兒子佈置一小間居室。

Ms. Kwon said she had trouble sleeping, thinking of what she would tell her son and what she should feed him when he arrives.

權女士說自己睡不好，一直在想要跟兒子說什麼，他來了以後給他做什麼吃的。

“I am still poor, but I owe him a lot of love,” she said.

“我依然很窮，但我欠他很多愛，”她說 。