life as a constant identity crisis

Here are some thoughts that have been churning in my head since my return to Korea, but I only realized I was thinking them today. Here's my story:

I first came to Korea in February of '05 to make some money. Lots of money. I was feeling poor and bored back home, sick of Bush and his cronies, and not particularly committed to anything or anyone. Honestly, the move to Korea didn't feel huge (I mean aside from the fact that I sold or gave away half of what I owned, put the rest in storage and had long and tearful goodbyes with my friends and family, especially my sister). I got here, found a community of friends and activists who accepted me and understood me and things were quite dandy. I even started trying to learn Korean, which believe me, is no small feat.

The following February, my employment contract was up (thank god!), I had banked some money and promptly made plans to spend it all traveling. "Why get a new job right away?" I said to myself. "A new employer won't give you time off for your sister's wedding, and here you are in Asia, so travel you idiot!" So my first month off I spent in China. That was fun. But a little lonely.

I returned to Korea the first week in April to hang out for a week before heading back to the USA for a reunion with my family and friends. And then the bombshell: You see actually, I was quite in love with someone who was also quite in love with me, only neither of us really knew it. Or didn't want to know it. We spent every free moment together that week without ever mentioning our feelings, that is until the night before I left. I know, that's so predictable, but we had good reasons to avoid each other, and our confessions were purely accidental.

This man, we'll call him the General Secretary, is an illegal worker in Korea. He is from Bangladesh and came here 10 years ago mostly because of the political situation in his country. He came into Korea on a tourist visa and has never left. He has worked in sweatshops (which abound in Korea), sewn clothes, built buildings, and has probably done a million other shitty things that I don't know about. The bitch of it is that this guy is an intellectual. A historian. And a bit of a language savant. And he has a social conscience. Let me tell you, I may be a woman in love, but this guy is really incredible.

Being in a relationship with an undocumented worker is terrifying. The Korean government has an official policy hunting migrant workers- migrants get picked up in subway stations, food markets, factories, and lately off the streets in any old place. It's easy here because well, the only Koreans that exist look Korean. Pretty much everyone else here is a tourist of some variety, so immigration just picks out all of the non-white foreigners, and because nearly two-thirds of the foreigners here are illegal, immigration's chance of finding someone to deport is more than decent. Every time the General Secretary is late (which is pretty much every day), every time he doesn't answer the phone or return a text message, I think he has been picked up by the police. Maybe this sounds irrational, but so many of our friends have been caught and deported over the last year, that hanging out in the migrant community begins to feel like hanging out in a terminal cancer ward. Appreciate every moment because you don't know if you'll see them next time.

The General Secretary's story is even more complicated. I really don't want to admit this (because I know my mom is reading!!), but when he left Bangladesh, he had a wife who was pregnant. So that's right, he has a lovely, brilliant and beautiful 10 year old daughter whom he has never met face to face, but talks to quite frequently on the phone. And if marriage is a complicated affair in Bangladesh, you should try divorce. No, there are no laws preventing it, and as far as I know, no social stigmas, BUT well, it seems to be a family affair. As though it's not complicated enough between two people, both his family and her family have been in negotiations for what seems like eons. Now I have to admit to you that this situation does not actually stress me out. Not yet. I mean really, this is only dangerous if immigration gets to him... before, before....

And this is where I am having an identity crisis.

It's like this: I never wanted to be married. Really. Not a priority, not in my plan (as much as a plan ever existed), and well actually, I'm kind of anti-marriage. You see, it's just that I think it's not the state or the church's business if someone is sleeping in my bed for a month or for the rest of my life. I can understand marriage in a social context, an important ceremonial context, but god and government need not be involved. And like I said before, I just didn't think marriage was for me. Marriage is for nice people. Like my little sister.

And Babies? Well, no fucking way was I ever going to bring a child into this nasty god forsaken world. Maybe one day, if I ever got old enough, I would adopt. But conception just seems like a painful idea, for a woman and a child.

So why then, am I having this sudden personal betrayal of everything I've felt sure of for as long as I can remember? I feel like I'm betraying my politics, my platform of zero population growth, and my feminism because, uh, these days I just want to get married and live in the country with a nice big garden and have a few babies. I mean, fuck this work world shit- it's a man's world and it can stay that way for all I care (no more whoring my labor out to bosses goddamn it!) Can't I puh-lease just be a housewife? I know it's hard work, but hey, you are your own boss, or at least your children are your boss and they may be tyrannical, but it's better than some strange man (or very confused woman) screwing you over every way he (or she) can figure out...

Oh the confusion. But really, maybe being a housewife is a subversive thing to do these days?