2018-19

This country creates a trap for Asian-Americans: you have to assimilate into white American culture. In order to assimilate, you have to get rid of everything about your culture: your language, your food, your history. But then once you assimilate into white American culture, you are still viewed as “foreign.” I am a perfect example of this trap. My family made a very intentional decision to not teach me Korean so I wouldn’t have an accent. My mom doesn’t cook Korean food when white people come to our house because it “smells bad.” I have lost my Korean-ness in the pursuit of assimilating into white culture, and that makes me really sad

I like to describe my filipino experience as two parts: the first 10-ish years of my life I had no connection; I really didn’t care about my culture. I was just strictly “American”. But when my grandma got diagnosed with cancer, I started going back every year, which led to me thinking about my identity. The first half of my filipino experience was me just wondering what being filipino since I did not feel a connection - Like there were people who look just like me, but I don’t speak your tongue, [and so forth]- then as I got older, it started to make more sense.

As for the second part, the next half of my life was me considering my own identity. A little less than 10 years ago, I started thinking about how I’m two things: 1) I am asian, and 2) I am American. When I start thinking about that, I was like “ok, I should start caring about my filipino culture because even though I had no choice in picking, it is who I am, and it’s something I should try to understand. That led me to work with a diaspora organization called Kaya Collaborative and then finding the Filipino association at the College, FASA. Looking back at it, I found that my filipino experience was me rediscovering my cultural identity as I grew up.

Being the oldest child in a Korean-American family comes with its perks, such as being the third parent to your 3 younger siblings or being the secretary of the family by taking care of the family’s bills and paperwork. When I was young, I resented those perks and thought I had no childhood. But in hindsight, those experiences have made me a more mature, educated, independent, and adulting-ready college student.

Being part of the 1.5 generation in the US, the hyphen in your identity becomes more important than ever. I embrace my Korean side, just as much as my American side. I appreciate the concept of respect that is built into the Korean language and culture while I also appreciate the concept of freedom that is built into the American culture. I just had to take the time and figure out how to balance the two identities into one beautiful hyphenated one.

My parents are both pretty politically involved. They’re the type of people who would look up candidates before an election and that sort of thing. My entire family is Democratic, although I think I’m a little bit more liberal and a little bit more anti-establishment than they are, so… I have to give the example of the 2016 primaries. They both voted for Hillary Clinton, whereas if I could have voted, I would have supported Bernie Sanders, so I think it’s kind of a generational gap, and I think it’s also just me kind of having a fresh look on politics- like I haven’t been observing it for decades in the way that my parents have, and so I’m not necessarily as used to the way things are compared to them[...] I’m more of an introverted person, and I never know how much that shows when I’m interacting with other people… that’s just kind of who I am. I can be a little bit shy sometimes. Like I have trouble kind of connecting with people and maintaining relationships or even holding up a conversation… and so even though that’s sometimes hard, it’s also something that I’m proud of. I see myself as someone who doesn’t need to interact with others to feel entertained or fulfilled. Like I’m perfectly happy to stay by myself somewhere if I need to be.

In high school], I was very comfortable with the fact that I was alone in my room not doing work or getting things done. And then I got to college and I met FASA and became so close with all of these extraordinary people [...] It’s just so important not be alone and to have a community.

In all but name, I’m an expat but you know, it’s weird. Usually you think of expats as like some white dude that like moved to another country, and he’s already got his own culture and he’s just taking that and living in France or Korea or whatever...for me, I was 7, I didn’t have much culture to speak of. All of the development I had was in this weird hybrid American-Korean-international environment, so I don’t know if I would consider myself an expat in the way that Ernest Hemingway or all of those other famous expats are. The term that my school used was “third culture kid”. They had a whole presentation and brought in some doctor from a university and it’s like “yeah third culture kids” and we’re like “I’m eight dude, what do you want me to do.” But looking back on that now, it makes sense. You’re not really an expat in a traditional way but you’re not one or the other, you’re kinda in this middle space.

 I actually only realized maybe a month or two ago that the term biracial applies to me. In my mind, it somehow never clicked that that’s who I am. For so long, before I moved to Japan, it was like, “Oh yeah, I’m Asian,” but… The term generally used to describe me would be Japanese-American or Asian-American, but it’s not that I’m just Japanese and [also] American. I am PART Japanese and PART… “American…” as my mind put [white] back then. I just didn’t know many people like me who were mixed. And then I went to Japan, and it was all homogenous Japanese society where there were maybe a couple people who didn’t fit the normal Japanese mold… Then I came back, and I was like, “Wait, where’s [the medium]…” I was starting to realize who I was and how I fit in and that I didn’t really fit in at my school into any ethnic group, because there were a few people who were fully Asian but American but maybe two mixed people like me at my school that I knew, and we didn’t even talk that much… So coming into college, I knew that I wanted to try to find a community of people that was more like me, if not exactly half Japanese and white mixed, some sort of community where that would be more common, and I found that in AASI when I came for the first time, so I was really lucky to find it.

What’s one thing that you would want people to know about APIA Studies?” “I can’t stress enough that Asian and Pacific Islander American Studies is for everyone. If we truly are members of the United States of America, we have an obligation to get to know the histories of our fellow community members. We are one nation, and it is not a nation if the members are excluded, unaware, or disinterested in each other. APIA Studies is the avenue by which all are humanized. Without this, Asian and Pacific Islander Americans are but collateral damage in various wars. Seen as illegal immigrants here to take our jobs, or terrorists. But when students take our courses, they know that these people are just human beings, like everyone else. It’s easy to take that for granted. Now more than ever, we see people dehumanizing others almost on a daily basis in the media.