How twin girls, separated at birth, were reunited on Facebook
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"Imagine one day opening Facebook and reading a message from a stranger that says, 'I think we might be twins…don’t freak out…' "
That's the pitch for a new book on Amazon, but it's also the beginning of a true story that brought Korean twins separated at birth back together.
"It all began when design student Anaïs Bordier viewed a YouTube video and saw her own face staring back," according to the book's description. Curiosity struck, and Bordier – a fashion designer from Paris living in London – started researching the Los Angeles actress who had her face.
Samantha Futerman was born in South Korea. In the port city of Busan. On November 19, 1987. And, she was adopted.
So was Bordier.
So she sent Futerman a message on Facebook.
Bordier admitted to "Google stalking" Futerman "A BIT."
"I don't want to be too Lindsay Lohan, well...but...how to put it…I was wondering where you were born [exactly]?" she wrote, offering the hospital she was born at, and her own original Korean name. (Lindsay Lohan played a twin sister separated at birth in the 1998 Disney movie "The Parent Trap.")
Bordier couldn't get past their resemblance. We look "really similar...like… VERY REALLY SIMILAR."
"You can check my facebook if you want to check the pictures and videos. It's more obvious on videos…"
She signed the note hopefully.
"Let me know...don't freak out…
Lots of Love
Anaïs"
The note began their journey to sisterhood, bonded through social media. "Over Facebook, Twitter, and Skype, they learned that they shared much more than a strikingly similar appearance," according to the book.
The pair finally met – matching face to matching face – in May 2013 when Samantha flew to London with her family and a small film crew to help document their reunion.
"After such an incredible reunion, our relationship quickly blossomed and our story continued to unfold in unexpected ways," the young women shared on the Kickstarter campaign page for a feature-length documentary on their story. "We were able to capture even more life-changing events, including 2 weeks in California and 10 days in Seoul, Korea where we attended the International Korean Adoptee Associations (IKAA) 2013 conference, visited our adoption agencies and together, discovered the land where our separation took place."
The two recorded their experience in alternating chapters in "Separated @ Birth: A True Love Story of Twin Sister Reunited," which explores "the complex and emotional layers of foreign adoption," and have exceeded their documentary fund-raising goal on Kickstarter.
"I was abandoned," one of them says through tears in the film trailer. "And I just realized that people loved me a long time ago."
"It totally changed my life for sure," the other says. "And totally changed my perspective on family."