Bahk Eun-ji has been with The Korea Times since 2012, building a career across multiple desks. She began at the Business Desk, where she conducted in-depth interviews with key figures in Korea's corporate world. Later, she moved to the Politics & City Desk, focusing on education policy and social affairs. She later served as team leader of the digital content team, leading curation efforts on the newspaper’s homepage and reshaping print stories for social media audiences to enhance digital reach. Now back on the Politics Desk, she covers the National Assembly and the Ministry of National Defense, with a renewed focus on political developments.
Heritage program opens new paths for ethnic Korean from Central Asia
Yoon Esther looks at cultural artifacts during a visit to the National Museum of Korea in Seoul in this undated photo. Courtesy of the Overseas Koreans Cooperation Center
By Bahk Eun-ji
For Yoon Esther, 26, a fourth-generation ethnic Korean from Kazakhstan, a recent heritage program in Seoul was much more than just a chance for a short visit.
“It felt like a chance to understand where I come from,” she said, recalling the five-day program hosted by the Overseas Koreans Cooperation Center. Through campus tours at Seoul National University and Inha University, and in conversations with others like her working in Korea, she said she began to see the country not as a distant place but as “a home we can still return to.”
One remark in particular stayed with her: the notion that the experience of the Koryo-saram is “not immigration but a homecoming.” Koryo-saram, who are also known as Koryoin, are ethnic Koreans from the former Soviet Union. Hearing it framed that way, she said, helped her understand their return to Korea not as a move to a foreign country but as a restoration of ties severed by history. The idea, she added, prompted her to rethink her own sense of belonging.
Yoon works as a project manager at one of Kazakhstan’s largest college prep institutes, which serves about 10,000 students across several cities. She designs programs that encourage students to learn with curiosity, rather feeling pressured to study.
“When I see their faces brighten, I know the work is worthwhile,” she said.
She noted that her sense of identity formed early through stories shared by her parents and grandparents. However, she also observed that many of her peers in the diaspora knew little about the history behind how their families moved to Central Asia.
“That made me want to do something,” she said. This led her to participate in cultural events, share information about scholarships and mentor younger students exploring opportunities in Korea.
Her own family’s history is a window into that past. Her grandfather was born on Sakhalin, a disputed island territory between Russia and Japan, and worked for Korean-language newspapers during the Soviet era before settling in Kazakhstan. Her great-grandparents were among the Koryo-saram who were forcibly relocated from Vladivostok under Soviet rule.
Yoon hopes to continue helping young people in her community. “Identity doesn’t survive on its own,” she said. “Someone has to choose to carry it forward.”