My favorite line in that is the scene where there are these two guys in a car and one them just smirks and laughs, then the other one who's driving says: "what?"
Other dude: "People, man."
Why are we all so different, when did you realize who you were or who you were supposed be based off how you look on the outside?
Being on the Peace Corps Diversity Committee and now am the new chairperson, we constantly are talking about identity.
And it has me thinking a lot about who I am and how I came to have the sort of lens through which I see the world. As does working with my Grade 2 class, how was I taught as a child to think or learn about the world? And really once again I think it all goes back to my adoption.
Constantly the black sheep in the family (based solely on skin color), surrounded by "white" people my entire upbringing...and never giving a second thought about it, never really noticing or feeling that I wasn't supposed to be there. Yet, somehow intrinsically knowing that I had to be okay with standing out looking different since this was my family and you can't change who your family is since they will always be part of you.
I remember the day when I realized I couldn't call myself "white" and that I could associate myself with the "bubble" that my mother and father would have filled it. When you're a child you don't see color, you just see who your classmates are as individuals and don't judge them or predetermine how they should be based on their outside coating.
I think I'm come to an interesting point in my life where I don't feel like a "poser" or a "wannabe" because I want to identify myself as Latina and I want to make it clear that I am a bilingual Spanish speaker, hot spicy foods, and yes I can dance salsa circles around you and identify with J.Lo. Since now I have that REAL Latina family that I am part of ....but not all of them dance like J.Lo or even know how to dance salsa. All these expectations that at one point in my life I was at one point trying to live up to, I have now become and realized it doesn't matter. Yes, of course I am super glad I can speak Spanish...though with a Castellano Spanish accent from Madrid. All these Latino things that at one point I thought I to fulfill have become there own, and that is me.
I am all these things plus am addicted to NPR (This American Life is the bomb dot com) and the New York Times, love yoga, run marathons, love dog breeds that eat too much (beagles and corgis preferably) and live for the world of public health non-profit. And have recently been introduced to the addictive world of chess.
None of these things listed above are what I would call stereotypically "Latino."
You get older and grow into who you really are and it's a fantastic type of calm. I have to worry about it anymore since I am who I am and that's fabulous :)
But then still the world continues to judge you by the cultural environment you come from and the color of your skin, when to you that is no longer an issue. You just begin to wonder when will all these stop? When will the children in my rural South African village stop calling my "Lekgoa" (white person in English)? When I'm back in the U.S.?
I'm going to stop there but this picture I took as I was filling out my Annual Volunteer Survey, since it once again felt like how it was when I went to fill out the US Census. I just choose other, since really I am not 100% of any of those.
Sent via my BlackBerry from Vodacom - let your email find you!
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