Simmone’s FamilyTreeDNA story: A search for family

Simmone’s father escaped North Korea just before the war began. He hopped on an airplane and settled in Toronto where he met her mother, a South Korean woman who had recently moved there. They had a family together, but Simmone’s father always wanted a son, and she did her best to try and fill that role for him.

A simple upload

Simmone’s FamilyTreeDNA story gets even more intriguing when she had the idea to get her father tested to try and find more of his relatives. Perhaps other family members had made it out of North Korea. When she uploaded her father’s autosomal results to FamilyTreeDNA, she was surprised, and a bit confused. There was a match, but to a man named John O’Brien. That was definitely not a Korean name.

An instant connection

After speaking with John, she eventually flew to San Francisco to meet him. As she sat waiting in a restaurant, a man walked in. Instantly, she felt an unusual connection to him. They were even wearing the same maroon color.

John explained that his mother had fallen in love with a Korean merchant marine. She died when he was young, and he always felt different. An Asian-looking man named John O’Brien was always going to stand out. It turned out that he had been searching for his father’s family his entire life.

Simmone and John are both still trying to figure out exactly how they’re related, but now she feels like she’s found the brother she’d been missing all this time. If you liked Simmone’s FamilyTreeDNA story, read about Ivy’s FamilyTreeDNA story.

Simmone & John