Kevin's Story

I had known that something was different with me from the beginning of my teen years-I had always found males to be more sexually attractive than females. To be more precise, I never really found females sexually attractive at all. This realization was also around the time of my immigration to US from Korea at the tender age of 12. Not speaking a word of English or even knowing the letter "H" of homosexuality at my arrival to Washington, DC in January, 87, I was very scared about what would lie ahead with the rest of my teen years and my future after college.

The first few years of growing up in US were not easy. Due to language barriers and my ethnic identity, it was so natural for me to immediately make Korean and Asian friends at school. I also made some Korean friends right away at the Korean church I used to attend. Even as my English was becoming more fluent and I was becoming more "Americanized," I never separated myself from the group of my Korean and Asian friends. In fact, I felt like I belonged to the local Korean and Asian community, and those communities were becoming a big part of my life.

As I went through my middle school and high school years, I noticed that this attraction I had towards other guys was becoming more serious. With all the things I was taught from my Korean church and my family about the traditional religious and Korean family values, I knew and believed that it was absolutely wrong to be gay. Most of my Korean and Asian friends I was hanging around with always dated someone of the opposite sex or had a serious boyfriend/girlfriend of the opposite sex. I would always think about having a girlfriend so I could fit in with the group of friends I had, but I was never motivated enough to actually have one. I knew that the guys in our group were more popular if they had girlfriends, and I always worried about what my other friends thought of me about not having a girlfriend or even just female dates. It did not take long, after my immigration to US, before I would learn words such as "Gay," "Queer," "Homosexual" and "Faggot." As I was coming to realize that I fit in the category of those words, I was getting pretty scared. In midst of those fears, I always just thought that my feelings would eventually go away one day. The term "homosexuality" did not exist in the Korean or Asian community to my group of high school friends. Coming out to my friends would mean that I was no longer going to be a part of them. Similarly, I thought that I would no longer be a true Korean or a true Asian if I came out as an openly gay person. Most of my Korean and Asian friends referred homosexuality as a thing that only existed in non-Korean and non-Asian groups.

My Mother would always talk to me about my future-specifically about my marriage. Only months after my arrival to US, she would start talking to me about how I would grow up to be a successful professional and would marry a wonderful Korean woman. The woman my parents referred to was not just any ordinary woman-she would have to be a well-educated Korean woman who would respect and be obedient to both my parents and myself. Each time my Mom would bring up the topic of my marriage, I felt like a new set of bricks were being added on to my shoulders on top of what was already there. I knew with my strong attraction towards other guys that a marriage with female will not last too long. Fortunately, the one thing my parents never pressured me about was my career - they never asked me to become a doctor, lawyer or engineer like many of the parents of my Korean and Asian friends did.

As soon as I arrived in US, one of the first places my family and I started attending was a Korean church. It was the same church that my uncle attended for many years prior to my family's arrival in Washington. As it is a pattern for many Korean-Americans who live in the US, that Korean church I attended would become more than just a church to me - a Korean social community that I couldn't separate myself from. Growing up, I would constantly have many nightmares about my sexual orientation, as I would repeatedly hear messages about how it is absolutely wrong to be homosexual. The pastors never seem to wait for too long before they would preach about the same topic again. I was very involved with the church youth group and their praise team. I had always envisioned that I would never be separated from that Korean church-they became a part of my life, a second family to me! There were many days where I would fall into strong depression, thinking about how I could be out as a Korean gay person and still be part of that Korean church. The more I thought about it, the more I realized that it is not possible for both of those things to happen. I thought about committing suicide a few times when my depression got really bad. Even though my suicidal thoughts continued and grew stronger, something inside of me also told me to just hold on.

All of my thoughts and wonders came to an end after I graduated from my High School. One of my former church friends, who I had shared my secret with, spread the news about my sexual orientation to some of the church youth group members. The pastors did not care about the fact that I had already spent four years prior praying to God asking for my sexual orientation to be changed. They told me that it was possible for me to change, suggested that I have a new girlfriend and stated that I had to keep praying to make it happen for a much longer time. I knew that it was something that could not be changed and made a decision to leave that church. It felt like the biggest tragedy of my life. I was letting go of a very significant part of my life that represented my ethnic, social and religious background.

This all happened around the same time that I faced a few more challenges - my parents and the group of Korean / Asian friends from my High School would find out about me as well. My parents did not want to accept me and wanted to believe that I was going through a phase in my life. They firmly believed that I would change. I ran into several arguments with my Mother that just did not get anywhere. She still does not accept my sexual orientation until this day. Except for three guys from high school, the rest of my many high school friends all stuck by and supported me. While I was coming out to all these different group of people at the same time, my friends who supported me carried me emotionally through this rough time of my life. I no longer had the "safe place," the Korean church, I used to rely on anymore.

In spite of all those crazy events taking place, I have learned to accept the fact that I am an ordinary person on this earth who just happens to have a natural attraction that some people don't know exits. I now attend a church in Washington, DC that serves the lesbian/gay community in the Washington Metro area. This church has allowed me to know that I did not have to forgo my religion, Christianity, just because of my sexual orientation. Even though my parents are still in denial about my sexual orientation, I hope for that to change in the near future to come when I have a life partner.

Kevin was born in Incheon, Korea in July 1974, and immigrated to the U.S. in January 1987. He has been in the Washington Metro area ever since. Kevin attended both middle school and high school in Montgomery County, MD. For college, Kevin attended University of Maryland College Park and majored in marketing. Kevin is an activist for many queer groups in the Washington Metro area. He belongs to the Safe Schools Coalitions of Montgomery County (SSCMC), a group that helps the students of high schools of Montgomery County, MD establish and maintain Gay/Straight Alliances (GSA's). Kevin also belongs to AQUA-Asian Pacific Islander Queers United for Action, which is a volunteer-based organization, promoting positive identity and general welfare for LGBTQ (queer) members of Asian and Pacific Islander (API) communities in the Washington, DC metropolitan area support group for Asian & Pacific Islander queers in the Washington Metro area.