Clara Yoon
FEATURE STORY
Interviewed by Samantha Joo
“There's a flower that grows in the darkness. It's called lirio de los valles. It actually does better in the shade. It blooms in spite of the darkness. You remind me of that flower.”
-Camila Vargas (badass cartel godfather - me) referring to Teresa Mendoza (protagonist and even more badass upstart - Clara), Season 1, Episode 3 (Queen of the South)
I have known Clara Yoon for over a decade now but in the years we have collaborated and worked together, I’ve only met her physically once, just two years ago in NYC, her home town and life (these New Yorkers be crazy about their city). While I was teaching at Seoul Women’s University in Korea, I started a new organization, Queer Koreans Alliance (presently known as Dding Dong), and wanted to connect with Clara because of her work with Asian-Pacific Islander (API) queer families in the US. She is the founder and leader of the API Project through PFLAG NYC (now API Rainbow Parents of PFLAG NYC). I think I reached out to over a 100 academics and activists in the US and Korea to develop first, a website that would provide resources and second, a safe space for queer teens in Seoul. Of all the people with whom I was able to establish contact, just about a dozen people, Clara was there from the very beginning, helping me to raise funds and developing a wide social network. I could not have asked for a better ally who has worked tirelessly to uplift the cause of the LGBTQ in the Asian communities, domestically and internationally. She is well-known in the API circles in the NYC area, definitely in the API queer community in the US, and now in Korea for her outspoken, radical activism arising from her experience as the mother of a transgender son (see her bio and more personal interview on Korean American Story).
In this interview however, I didn’t want to focus on her social activism which has been trailblazing but Clara the person. I think most of us have been defined by our social identities, familial connections, work titles, and noteworthy (google-able) accomplishments. And Clara is definitely not short of accolades and impressive title, Vice President, CCB Digital Technology at JPMorgan Chase, which she fails to mention in her bio. I know! I would lead with that title and nothing else cause let’s face it, most of us only dream of such high paying jobs. Yet once in a while, we are stripped of the very identities that have defined us. We find ourselves without a job, without children, without a partner, and it is these very moments that actually define the person, I think. Who are we or what are we made of? And it is at such moments that Clara blooms.
When you journey along a person for over a decade, you learn about the ways in which they face challenges. I was introduced to Clara from the articles interviewing her about her activism and have come to know her well through some really challenging times, a few of which would have invariably broken some people. Yet what I find most fascinating about her is the way she doubles down to meet each challenge with a desire to grow. Since her son came out, she tried to educate herself on transgender identity, when she was let go from Goldman Sachs, she traveled the world for a year, when her son left home, she tried to redefine their relationship which she is continually doing as they both grow into themselves, when she felt her body approaching menopause, she was proactive in trying to understand the physical changes so she can be prepared, and most recently, when she divorced her husband, she decided to take time to become more intimate with herself rather than sulk and be miserable. Of all the challenges that I am aware of, the last one speaks about her character more than anything else.
I’ve known people who from their womb have never been alone or never allowed themselves to be alone in their own body and self - like all my siblings (consequently, I am an oddball in my family). They run from one relationship to another, chase busyness, or shut themselves off from everything with some form of addiction, alcohol/drugs/sex, anything but to be left alone with their own thoughts, their naked selves. It is really scary to face oneself, especially if one has spent their whole lives running away from seeing themselves for who they are. We don’t want to look at the wounds of our past, the traumas that form us, the mistakes we have made, the lost dreams we have failed to accomplish, and expectations we don’t know how to live up to. It definitely isn’t pretty if we only look at the wrinkles, second trimester bellies, baggy eyes, saggy arms. (Yes, this is about my body image issues, not Clara who she is extremely petite and fit - she jogs and as everyone knows, I vigorously, religiously oppose running but absolutely marvel at people who can.) But if you just listen and look more carefully, you will discover the survivor and thriver you have been and continue to be. There is absolute beauty in the conversation we can have with ourselves which Clara clearly understands. Clara sees endless possibilities and wonder of coming into awareness of her present dreams, wants, desires, unhindered by relationships. Who is Clara? What does Clara want? What does Clara hope for in this world? How does Clara see herself unfold into her very-ness? I was inspired in our zoom conversation when she shared the intimacy she was beginning to develop with Clara.
I am not saying that Clara never had moments of darkness - she is very honest in sharing such moments with me. But she does not stay there or allow such moments to make her stop living. No, she plunges ahead, being transformed by the very darkness that constantly tries to snuff out her light. She is and will always be a fighter, one who will now put her needs more at the forefront as much as she has battled for her son’s acceptance and rights in our intolerant society.
And if you’re wondering, it is not selfish to know what it is that we want in life, especially women who have been asked to wonder what others, their parents, partners, children, bosses, friends, society want. On the contrary, it is in redefining and reprioritizing our lives that we can give most effectively to our relationships and communities. We will know that it is for us that we serve, not with resentment or bitterness for serving the needs of others but never the self.
I can honestly say one thing about Clara, she is like lirio de los valles, a flower that grows because not in spite of the darkness. She is the woman that she has become because of the way she faced each challenge, with mind, heart, and action, the very daring which all good leaders should have.
Now to the interview. This interview is longer because Clara decided to highlight the conversation we had instead of responding to the questions I emailed her previous to the zoom meeting. It is richer because it reflects our actual conversation rather than her isolated responses. If you know anything about the process of these interviews, I tend to veer off to topics that interest me. I am selfish that way but then I don’t care what you think about me. I am Camila Vargas, a drug cartel godfather (somehow godmother doesn’t have the same ring - it reminds me of a fairy godmother and I definitely ain’t one).
INTERVIEW
Sam: What was it like for you to live by yourself after so many years?
Clara: I grew up in typical Korean immigrant family in southern California in late 80’s and it was not common for women to leave home before they got married. You stay home after you graduate college and you got married. So I’ve never had an experience of living all by myself with this level of financial stability. I spent the first 25 years of life living under the protection of my parents and the next 25+ years as a wife and mother. This is a new experience for me and I really like it! I am finally finding myself and getting to know who I am without anyone demanding and judging who I should be.
Sam: So if you are to do with your life all over again, would you give yourself one or two years to be by yourself before you got married and how would it have changed you?
Clara: I would have liked that but I think it's not about being single or living by myself that would have made the difference. I think it's about the environment and who you interact with. I wish I had a mentor or someone like you, Sam, who is open-minded and not judgmental, who pays attention to me, encourages me, and guides me to understand myself better. God knows what I could have become if I had that mentorship and more affirming environment in my early 20s.
Sam: What or how would your decisions be different if you had mentors or more affirming environment?
Clara: Fortunately, the decisions I made in my teenage years like what colleges to apply, what to major in and how to navigate in this world turned out ok, but not without scars or bitter memories in my teenage years.
What would have made a difference in my life is that I probably wouldn't have to go through the feeling of being alone. I was 13 years old when I moved to US with my family to Southern California in early 1980’s. Learning English, being bullied at school, trying to fit in, and trying to live up to model minority myth as the eldest child in the family were my reality. I did what was expected of me but could not really relate to what was going on. I wish I knew the vocabularies to be able to articulate my emotion at that time and someone who would just listen to me. I was feeling lonely and the world seems strange to me but I didn’t have anyone to talk to explore and deal with those feelings.
And my extended family and parents couldn’t help then because they also never learned to create an affirming environment and deal with their own emotions and mental health. I believe we carry the trauma from our prior generation because you pass on what you learned from your environment to the next generation without realizing it.
Few years ago, I participated in the Story Corp with my son for Asian Heritage Month celebration. During the recording, my son mentioned in a rather apologetical tone that he learned most of his values from others rather than from his parents. I didn’t get upset. In fact, I was actually thankful and told him that this meant I did a great job as a mom. I knew I could only teach him certain things based on my own experience and I’d rather have him more exposed to other ideas and experiences beyond what I could offer to help him develop his own value system. As a mother, that was a great gift to know and I just love how he turned out in his mid 20s! I wish I had a parent like me and a friend like my son.
I think we should always strive to question the status quo and traditions. We need to be intentional on what we want to pass to the next generation and what we want to fix so that our next generation can have better lives than what we had. To do so, we need to educate ourselves and question our own values and upbringing because those are the by-product of our environment we grew up which we did not choose.
Sam: So now you're a single woman and your son is moving on with his life, how do you see yourself at this moment?
Clara: I am using this time to finally get to know about myself as a person, who I am, what I like and what I don’t like, not as someone’s daughter, wife or mother. It is really liberating and eye opening experience.
Sam: LGBTQ issues, are you still passionate about those issues or do you find that your passion has shifted a little bit?
Clara: For me, LGBTQ advocacy work I do is not a question about passion since my life has been so ingrained and centered around LGBTQ community for the last 10 years since my son came out. I started API Rainbow Parents as a special program within PFLAG NYC in 2012 to support other Asian parents like me who have LGBTQ kids.
Of course, my focus would shift depending on the need at that time. At this point in my life, I’m very invested in building parent leadership pipeline so they can continue to carry this work. After founding and growing the organization at the grassroots level for a few years, I am happy to say I now have a great team of leadership within API Rainbow Parents, including passionate parents and LGBTQ individuals. While I was going through the divorce process and moving around before settling into a new apartment, they have been very supportive and stepped up to take more responsibility. We need to continue this trend to develop strong leadership of API parents as super allies who advocate for their children and LGBTQ community broadly in API community in US and in the country of our heritage. With recent Black Lives Matter movement, one of parents took an initiative to organize zoom meetings to create a safe and brave space for parents to discuss Black Lives Matter as Asian immigrants and examine and unpack our own anti-blackness. Many of us had eye opening moments. We saw the similarity in anti-LGBTQ and anti-blackness in terms of colonialism, system of power and privilege, and lack of understanding the history and struggle.
Sam: Do you see yourself doing the same thing 10 years from now or with a different focus?
Clara: As I approach my retirement, I would like to write a memoir about my journey, which I think is pretty amazing and interesting. I believe it will resonate with many people who might be going through profound changes in their lives like I did. I’m sure I would be supporting the community one way or the other. I'm still learning about myself and exploring who I am, so who knows what my life would look like in 10 years.
Sam: Do you see yourself in a relationship 10 years from now?
Clara: I hope so. It's not my intention to live my life all by myself. But I think it would be a different relationship than the kind of relationships I had previously. What’s interesting is that when I was growing up it wasn't an option for me to pursue a relationship other than marriage at the end. I think I would want a relationship that is based on trust and openness to listen and willingness to navigate the differences in personality and values. My ex-husband and I went through a few years of intense marriage counseling and own personal therapy session before deciding to divorce. Toward the end, we realized that given our own upbringing and all circumstances in our marriage, we did best we could as a family. Having this realization helped us take ownership of our own wrong-doings, instead of blaming others for the failure of our marriage. In some ways, we had to forgive ourselves so we could move on without resentment and regrets. It also helped my son give us his blessing. He sat us down for 30 minutes with a beautiful speech after we told him our decision to divorce. He told us that we did really good job as parents and he is happy to see us creating a different kind of family.
Yes, I could be spending rest of my life, resenting and mourning for good 25+ years of my life gone wasted. But I choose happiness. Divorce is NOT just an end of marriage. It is a beginning of new life and new possibilities.
Sam: As a woman going through menopause, how are you managing the changes in your body and how are you dealing with that?
Clara: I'm basically going through this experience without resisting or resenting it. When I turned 50 a few years ago, I asked my doctor what I should expect to see and what are the ways to manage the physical changes. I think it’s part of life that we all have to go through. The fact that I have a great set of friends who have gone through this experience before me has also helped tremendously. They are willing to share their own experience and wisdom when I ask.
I have been really bad at taking care of myself because other people’s need came first. Now that I don’t need to worry about others, I have no excuse but to learn to listen to what my body is telling me and care for it to last at least next 20 or 30 years. I understand menopause is a sign of our body aging, which in turn is a path to dying. I have been making peace with the fact that everyone dies at some point and nobody knows when that will be. Yes, as a newly single person (I don’t like to use the word, divorced), I worry about my retirement and my financial stability in my old age. One thing I learned through my LGBTQ advocacy work is the importance of having a support system. I am fortunate to have built relationship with many people from different background but with similar goal and progressive thoughts and we practice self-care and encourage others to do the same. By sharing and allowing yourself to be vulnerable, you are inviting others to do same and you feel less lonely. You are not alone in this journey of life. Many went through this ahead of you and many are going through it along with you. I find comfort knowing I’d be ok and I’ll deal with whatever my life will bring to me in the coming years.
Clara’s final thoughts
Although I have been doing LGBTQ advocacy work past several years, I want people to know that it was a journey to get to where I am right now. I have grown as a person and my view of life also expanded. To be effective in any non-for-profit work, we need to build support system and learn to draw boundary and practice self-care. I went through a couple of personal challenges including my divorce past few years but with help from other parents, friends and my own support system, I can still continue to pursue my passion and also build a new life for myself. Be kind to yourself and accept, affirm and love yourself unconditionally. In turn, you can do the same to others.
ABOUT
CLARA YOON is a parent of a bi/queer son with trans experience. She is the founder of the API Rainbow Parents of PFLAG NYC chapter, a group providing support for LGBTQ individuals and families of Asian heritage. She also serves on the Board of Directors of the PFLAG NYC chapter. Clara is passionate about supporting and advocating for LGBTQ youths specifically to prevent bullying, suicide and homelessness. She also believes in the importance of improving LGBTQ equality in API homelands and faith groups to create better acceptance to LGBTQ individuals within the API communities. She has conducted and led many workshops and events across US, Japan, and Korea on such topics.