"What is it like to be a teenager in America,
adopted from India?"

My name is Elizabeth Illien. I am seventeen, a senior at North Atlanta High School and involved right now in college applications. Pretty much everyone else in my class is doing the same thing. We are all eager to graduate, figure out soon which college we want to go to, and then hope that our first choice college accepts us. We are all concerned about our ACT and SAT scores, and our grades in our senior year, and deadlines for everything. I want to look my best every day, want to talk to my friends and still do my homework and still have time for my social life on weekends. I seem to be doing just about the same thing all of my friends are doing. I know that next year everything will change when I go to college and I’m kind of nervous about that. But at the same time it is exciting. I am one of the few kids my age who knows what I want to do: I have known for a very long time that I want to be a French teacher.

As I am looking at all of the college applications I have to fill out, everyone is advising me that I have to make my essays stand out and be different from the essays of the other applicants. As I started looking for what made me different, it was not easy, since I seem to so much like everyone else. My grades are OK but I am definitely not at the top of my class. As far as my appearance goes, I know that I am pretty. In that area I am exceptional. Everyone has told me that all my life. I am interested in doing some modeling but I know I should not try to do it as a career because beauty comes and goes. And I know I can’t get into college on my good looks! I have always loved to speak French and I am good at it, but even that does not make me stand out or different from all of the other college applicants.

The topic of the college essay is to describe what is the most significant event in my life (and don’t let it be the same as every other applicant’s!), or to describe the most important person who has influenced me (my Mom, of course, but then my essay would be like everyone else’s!) What should I do? So I decided to write about being adopted.

Usually I don’t even think about it. I have always known I came from India. So did my brother. My sister, who is also adopted, came from Atlanta and when we were little and all went swimming together, Julie would turn bright pink and get burned fast even if she did put on lotion. She would have to get out of the pool and out of the sun while Jayme and I were still having a good time. Poor Julie! She would burn and blister! I love to get darker in the summer time. Everyone tells me "You are so dark, Elizabeth, you look great!"

My mom told me that when I was about five years old and was in 5K, she was reading all of us a book one day and I pointed to a picture of a little girl with blond hair and blue eyes and said "That’s me!" My brother, Jayme, said right away, "No, it’s not, Dummy, you’re brown!" According to the family story, I answered, "I don’t want to be brown; I want to be white!" Actually, I don’t even remember the story because all I remember is everyone telling me all my life how pretty I am. That has given me a lot of self confidence.

I grew up knowing I was from India. We always had Indian visitors at our house and my mother was always going to India for her adoption agency. We used to go to the airport a lot, my brother and sister and I, and meet the planes with the babies coming in from India. We saw the families at the airport get their babies and everyone usually cried. Not us kids. We just wanted the ice cream bars out of the machines and loved to ride in the trains. The babies were really cute, though. Sometimes they stayed overnight at our house and I got to take care of them. Sometimes I got really attached.

There are two other family stories that my mom told me that I don’t remember. When I was about three, I asked my mom one day, "Mommy, am I adopted?" She said yes. "Does that mean I came out of somebody else’s belly?" She said yes. "Oh." That is apparently all I wanted to know. Another time there was an Indian lady who stayed with us and I said to her, "When you go back to India will you see my Indian mommy?" She did not know what to say. "because if you do, will you tell her that I am OK and that I love my American mommy very much."

When I was ten, my mother took me to India with her. We stayed with our family friends and I got to see the place where I was born. Everyone there was so nice to me and made me feel welcome. But people came up to me and tweaked my cheeks and spoke Hindi to me. They thought I was Indian. But I’m not. I had a nice time, but I really missed home and Jayme and Julie. I was so glad to get home to my own bed and my television. I am so glad that I was adopted. I cannot imagine growing up in India.

I saw so many kids in the streets, really poor and dirty. Even if they had families, they lived on the sidewalks, looked really hungry, many of the children begged for food. It was hot in India, but even so, these people didn’t have clothes, just dirty rags.

I am so glad that I was adopted. I like my life, love my family and friends. I don’t even want to go away to school. I always get very homesick when I am away. I cannot imagine anything worse than to be alone without a family.

I have never felt "different" but I have always felt special. I grew up knowing people from all over the world. In our house we never knew who was going to be the next visitors. We has people staying there from India, Russia, Romania, Venezuela, Brazil, Germany, etc. and we had exchange students from Chile France, and India. When I was growing up, we never talked about diversity, we just lived in the middle of it. I feel comfortable in my world, secure in my family. I belong here. I know that I can go anywhere I want and pursue any career that interests me. Eventually I want my own family, my husband and children (only one!). I know myself, I want to stay close to home.

I cannot even imagine what my life would be today if I have stayed in India and not been adopted. I would rather be dead.

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Elizabeth Indira Illien is the daughter of Anna Belle Illien, Founder and Executive Director of Illien Adoptions International, Inc. in Atlanta, Georgia.  This article was originally featured on RainbowKids.com.