Sometimes, navigating an unfair system is the only way to make progress. NCRC is not the agency that “sold” us.

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You can catch more flies with honey than with vinegar…

In my nearly decade-long struggle to obtain — or rather, wrest — information from my Korean Adoption Agency, KSS (Korea Social Service), I’ve endured many deeply scarring experiences. I’m grateful I pushed as hard as I did, while also recognizing that I made mistakes along the way. Still, I do not absolve KSS of its primary responsibility in any of this.

Most of us know that our former Korean Adoption Agency files are (currently) housed at NCRC’s Temporary Storage Facility in Goyang, Gyeonggi-do. These files are likely to move AGAIN sometime in 2026 to the Seongam Branch of the National Archives.

When meeting with NCRC in person — either at NCRC’s Temporary Storage Facility in Goyang, Gyeonggi-do to VIEW your file, or at NCRC’s Main Office in Seoul to receive a scanned COPY of your file — some of you might get further by working with them than against them.

This may be true even when we know the system is patently rigged against us and inherently unfair.

Screaming at them that “You sold us!” is first of all, not true — that was our Korean Adoption Agencies, not NCRC — and second of all, this is not likely to get you further in terms of obtaining information from NCRC.

(By the way, I’ve never said things like this to anyone at KSS or NCRC. But I have heard of others who have said things that are similar).

Sometimes, you can catch more flies with honey than with vinegar…

I am not saying not to push to get information. I certainly have done so in my own search. But screaming at NCRC social workers probably won’t result in your getting more information.

I strongly recommend that if you plan to visit NCRC, that you try to take a Korean translator with you.

This can act as a buffer for our understandably very raw emotions when we are in the room with our former Korean Adoption Agency file at NCRC’s Temporary Storage Facility in Goyang, Gyeonggi-do, or obtaining a copy of it at NCRC’s Main Office in Seoul.

Please see:

ALL Korean Adoptees Start Here!
General Birth Family Search Steps Through NCRC — Overview.

Also be sure to check out our MANY posts about the NCRC process on the Paperslip Blog BEFORE you submit your Petition for Adoption Information Disclosure request to NCRC.

It is NOT NCRC’s fault if you do not understand their procedure and rules in advance of submitting your requests.

Good luck out there!