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Half-North Korean, half-Chinese kids struggle in South Korea

In this Nov. 6, 2019, photo, Song Hong Ryon, pauses for a moment during an interview in Uijeongbu, South Korea. Song Hong Ryon looks like any other young woman in South Korea. But three years after her arrival from China, the half-North Korean, half-Chinese 19-year-old has made only two South Korean-born friends and says she's often been hurt by little things, like when people ask if she's from China because of her accent.(AP Photo/Lee Jin-man)
In this Nov. 6, 2019, photo, Song Hong Ryon, pauses for a moment during an interview in Uijeongbu, South Korea. Song Hong Ryon looks like any other young woman in South Korea. But three years after her arrival from China, the half-North Korean, half-Chinese 19-year-old has made only two South Korean-born friends and says she's often been hurt by little things, like when people ask if she's from China because of her accent.(AP Photo/Lee Jin-man) In this Nov. 6, 2019, photo, Song Hong Ryon, pauses for a moment during an interview in Uijeongbu, South Korea. Song Hong Ryon looks like any other young woman in South Korea. But three years after her arrival from China, the half-North Korean, half-Chinese 19-year-old has made only two South Korean-born friends and says she's often been hurt by little things, like when people ask if she's from China because of her accent.(AP Photo/Lee Jin-man)

By Associated Press 7 min read

UIJEONGBU, South Korea (AP) – Song Hong Ryon looks like any other young woman in South Korea. But three years after her arrival from China, the half-North Korean, half-Chinese 19-year-old has made only two South Korean-born friends and says she’s often been hurt by little things, like when people ask if she’s from China because of her accent.

“I’ve agonized about it a lot by myself,” she said.

Song’s mother fled North Korea in the late 1990s in search of food and work in China, like tens of thousands of other North Korean women did to avoid a famine at home. Many women ended up being sold to poor Chinese farmers as brides, before fleeing again and moving to South Korea, which considers the North part of its territory and therefore embraces North Korean refugees.

Many of the children of these marriages, if they’re able to reunite with their mothers in the South, are alienated and frustrated as they struggle to navigate a strange culture, cut off from friends and many of their relatives.

To tell their little-known stories, The Associated Press talked to three of the children, two of their North Korean mothers and an array of school teachers, experts and government officials.