Reuniting Families Thru DNA
What's new 325Kamra ?
 Korea Operations Team
Inter-Cultural Family Mission Conference
AKA-SF Conference Panel
Bonn, Germany Gathering and DNA distribution
Want to make a difference? Interested in a DNA match but frustrated with not having found one? Come May 2018 (Family Month in South Korea), 325Kamra is going to hit the road in South Korea, traveling to various cities and villages to present our DNA stories and to distribute DNA kits to any willing participants. Our goal is to grow the Korean DNA database. Please help support this project by donating today!
Meet the new Korea Dream Team!
325Kamra wants to welcome new board member, Maria Savage, who is our Director of Korea Operations in Seoul! Maria was born in Sinrim-myeon in Gangwon-do as Lee Ja Hye. She grew up in Minnesota, where she enjoyed attending Korean culture camps. She received her undergraduate degree in Museum Studies in Iowa, and moved to Korea in 2013, where she met her partner. Maria completed her post-graduate degree in Early Childhood Education Studies in Nottingham, England and she and her husband recently returned to South Korea to live. Maria is inspired by using DNA testing as a means for reunion!
325Kamra is also pleased to introduce JooEun Cho, our DNA Manager in Korea. She is a student of Social Welfare and International Studies at Ewha University. She will be graduating from there in February 2018 but will be doing 325Kamra work full-time. JooEun lived several years in Sri Lanka and is fluent in both Korean and English. 

Maria and JooEun together make up our new 325Kamra Korea Operations team. They have some exciting plans this year for spreading the word about DNA testing and 325Kamra in Korea. One of the ambitions in Korea will be a tour in May (which is family month in Korea). The team will be visiting different cities on the peninsula, inviting birth families, adoptees, and interested Koreans to come conduct a DNA test with us. Adoptees who have tested with us will also be invited to join on this tour to tell their stories in their birth towns.
  
The 325Kamra Korea team is also busy setting up workshops at senior centers and universities to spread the word about DNA testing and to share the reunion stories that have been facilitated by 325Kamra. These are just a few new endeavors that 325 has planned in the upcoming year; we look forward to keeping you updated as they are rolled out!
Other Korea news!!!
325Kamra wants to welcome new board advisor Professor Helen Noh to the team. Dr. Noh has been a professor at the Department of Social Welfare of Soongsil University since 1995. She received her BS degree in Social Work from Ewha Woman's University and her MSW and PhD in Social Welfare from UC Berkeley. Since child and family welfare have been her main interests, Dr. Noh has been active in research and providing consultation aimed at improving practice and policy in Korea since her return there in 1992. She has a special interest in the field of adoption because of her experience as an adoption worker in three different adoption agencies: Holt Children's Services in Korea, Children's Home Society of San Jose and Holt International Children's Services in Oregon, U.S. Welcome Dr. Noh!
Visiting Peace Village
This past September, 325Kamra board member Tia Legoski traveled to Peace Village in Robertsville, Missouri to attend the annual Intercultural Family Mission Conference. Most of the people who attended this conference were inter-culturally married Korean women. This event was held Tuesday through Saturday and Tia had an opportunity to share our 325Kamra DNA stories. She also talked about how 325Kamra was created and why. She told them about how many children were adopted out of Korea after the Korean War, both full Korean and biracial children. Her goal was to let everyone know how important it was to do DNA and why. Tia had taken 25 FTDNA kits to the conference and was able to use all of them. Her thanks go to Pastor Stark and Chairwoman Kim Crandall who gave 325Kamra an opportunity to share our success stories and the 325Kamra vision. 
325Kamra at the AKA Conference in San Francisco
Over 230 awesome adoptees gathered together at the #AKASFConference learning about their past and seeing what the future could bring.

Bella Siegel-Dalton, a co-founder of 325Kamra, was able to provide DNA kits (Thank you Thomas Park Clement) at the Friday night social, and to give a presentation Saturday on the uses of DNA and reuniting with family. Bella talked about what 325Kamra has achieved and what we hope to do in the future.

Her message at the conference and to everyone is, "do what you can to increase the database of non-adoptee Koreans. If each one of us (200k Korean Adoptees worldwide) could get 4 people who are Korean and who have known family history to DNA test, we could increase the database by almost 1 million Koreans. Lets take the bull by the horns and be the Captains of our destinies!"

Opening dialogue with others may also help us move forward. While Bella was at a dinner at the residence of one of the most famous Korean Chefs in San Francisco, a person there admitted that they had a sister that they thought may have been adopted. They are going to DNA test so that they can try and find the adoptee. We all know that walking the walk is important, but talking the talk can prove fruitful as well!
DNA Matches to Date
37 Matches made with 325Kamra membership
27 on-going DNA searches with 325Kamra membership, with 4 near completion
At least 26 automatic matches made using various DNA kits
Sara Smith: Finding a KAD Brother thru DNA
I really had no interest in taking a DNA test. However, two years ago I was convinced by friends, and family members, that it would be a good idea. I was able to take advantage of the generosity of Thomas Park Clement, and received a free 23andme DNA kit. Having no expectations at all in finding any close DNA relatives, I was completely shocked when my test results came back. I had a match with a “potential niece”. A niece would mean that I had a full biological sibling I had no knowledge of. I had reviewed my adoption file in Korea at my agency and orphanage. There was no mention of a sibling. I soon found out I had a brother who was adopted into a different family in the US. I also discovered I had a nephew, who had the same name as my oldest son. It was amazing to find out I had biological family in the US.
 
After a few months of email correspondence with my brother, my husband and I went to visit him for the first time. I had never been more nervous about anything in my entire life. It was surreal and awkward, but a good first meeting. Six months later we visited again with our kids, and attended my niece’s high school graduation. It was really wonderful to see the cousins interact, and notice similarities in them. This was something I never could have imagined. Without DNA testing, I believe we would have gone the rest of our lives without knowing of our biological connection. I hope that others with similar stories, find their way back to each other. 
Distributing DNA Kits in Bonn, Germany!
Thank you Jayme Hansen for continuing to travel in Europe to KAD gatherings and distribute kits. The Australia trip has been postponed to 2018.

For those who are in South Korea and want to DNA test while there, contact Maria Savage via email: mariasavage@gmail.com or JooEun Cho at the following email: 325kamrajc@gmail.com. You can also contact KoRoot .

For those in Europe who want kits click on this link: DNA kit
Special thanks to 325Kamra donors Glen Morey, Aimee Belser, Kathy Augenstein, Karen Schick Macagno , David Hohnbaum, Steven Barnhurst, Linda Papi Rounds, Michael Waldman, Maria van den Bosse, Pamela Argallon-Garcia , Michael Jessup ,Raymond Jean, Peggy Rose Webster, Laura Jae In Breeman , Soonghei Voigt and many many others who have participated on our online FB fundraiser this month! Thank you for your incredible generosity! Thanks also to all the new KAD members!
All FTDNA kits used by 325Kamra, Inc. are donated by Thomas Park Clement and his T&W Foundation. Thanks as always to him for his generosity to the KAD community and to our organization.