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Sunday, November 23, 2008

She's brown and fat, she must be....

SAMOAN.
I'm an unusual mix - half Filipino, the other a half a mix of Spanish, Native American and Welsh. It confuses people. Strangers have always always asked me ,"What are you?". There's usually some type of office pool when I start a new job. It's disconcerting.
When I was young and skinny, I confounded people. Maybe I was Filipino, but I was too tall (5'7" - yes, I know, not that tall, but as a Filipino woman (Filipina) that is almost Giant status - my mom topped out at 4'11" and a half). Possibly Latina or Hawaiian, something different. I was stopped in bathrooms, malls, people would stare at me.
Now I'm a bit older and a lot fatter. I still get Latina and Hawaiian, now I get Samoan. Samoan? Why Samoan? Because I have brown skin and eyes, black hair and I'm fat? I get it all the time. So I googled Samoan people and then Samoan women. They seem to have the same ratio of skinny and fat people as other ethinicities.
Any explanations?

4 comments:

Michael said...

I don't look half-Chinese, half-Filipino. I just look like... The Chinese kid that went around the world and has never had a home.

It's an even bigger problem when it comes to my accent. I sound sort of American with a tinge of British and a tinge of all these others things. I call it 'Internationalese'.

People who can't distinguish other people's nationalities shouldn't speculate. It's rude and it's embarrassing if they get it wrong (Filipina to Samoan, really?).

I wish you luck in facing these buffoons in the future. Hahaha.

Michael.

Anonymous said...

Pure ignorance, does it matter? Not in the least. I often get the same here in Brazil, but it's not as racially motivated as your attacks seem to be.

AV
http://netherregionoftheearthii.blogspot.com/
http://tomusarcanum.blogspot.com/

avm0525 said...

It is frustrating that some people feel the need to catergorize others.
I just can't figure the Samoan thing out. Why Samoan? There are other ethinicities with fat, brown people out there.

The Jules said...

It's better when you come from a long line of bastards, like I do. Heritage then becomes something that happens to other people.