How old are you?

[PonyGirl93]

(I'm not going to go into into becuase I sort of hate it when white people do that to make themselves seem more "exotic" when they actually seem to dislike people like me who actually are "exotic". So instead of saying I am scottish, german, romanian, , bulgarian, swedish, irish,French, Moldovian, Czech, Hungarian with a bit of Native American from the Seneca Nation , etc on my dad's side(and no I am not all of what I listed. Only 3 of them,just trying to make a point!).

Ummm... Ow.

[Ruddigore]

Anyways, talking about race for me is always a sore spot. Since it's a big part of my life....I can't help but that race mostly takes center stage. Especially growing as a child and adolescent in a very caucasian community that made me feel very unwelcome.

One thing I learned -

Being part white but looking too ethnic = bad.
Looking white but getting to say how mixed you are = good.

Our culture has a lot of latent racism in it, which if you're not on the receiving end of it, can be difficult to dig up and examine, especially as a young person. You know you're not supposed to feel animosity towards people for ethnic reasons -- but what culture says and what culture does aren't always the same.

When I met my best friend (half Panamanian), I felt some of the confusion that results in growing up in a society that isn't completely sure what it believes about race. "Aren't they different?" Eventually, I figured out from experience that the answer is "No" just like you're told. Now I'm teaching ESL and enjoying very much.

We like to think we have that whole racism thing behind us, but I'm afraid will be a while yet before the whole "human race-only" thing sinks in.

Thanks for your post, April.


Oh, and I'm still 20...to keep this post somewhat on topic...