Carla Kobilinski, 31, NJ
When people ask me where I’m from, my first answer is always New Jersey. Then I pause.
90% of the time, there’s a follow up clarifying question.
At a bar or in college it was always: No, Where are you really from? At work it’s usually: Where is your family from?
Both questions point to the same thing, you can’t be from New Jersey with a face like that.
Technically, they’re correct—I am not a native Jersey girl. I moved to the US when I was eight after spending 4 years in the Philippines and 4 years in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia. Assimilation was multi-faceted. English? Easy. Customs? Not so much. Imagine little me on the first day of third grade flabbergasted by my classmates hands over hearts reciting words in unison without a second thought (they were saying the pledge of allegiance).
It’s been 23 years since then. Now, I speak English better than my mother tongue,Tagalog. I cook burgers and pasta more often than chicken Adobo. I can name all 50 US states, many monuments and national parks but I would be hard pressed to tell you more than a handful places in the Philippines.
And yet, I will always be foreign to many Americans. I will always be Other. Even though I can debate the existence of central Jersey or proclaim the superiority of Taylor Ham over pork roll—I will always have an origin story not rooted in the Garden state.
It breaks my heart to know that many other people of color feel the same way. No matter how well we assimilate or play by the rules, this isn’t home. This sense of alienation resonates even more deeply this week. But sadly, the horrific shootings in Atlanta are not an isolated incident. There were almost four thousand racist attacks on the AAPI community in the last year alone.
So where do we go from here? How can we move past this? Because it’s uncomfortable to hear about the atrocities of racism, we jump straight to action. But to dismantle our biases, to really truly grow we must ruminate in this discomfort. We must challenge ourselves with introspection. We must think of ways our own thoughts and feelings can be rooted in racist ideals. We must challenge those around us to do the same. Action can take the form of being honest with ourselves and giving each other the grace and space to learn new ideas or in most cases unlearn old ones.
For resources to Stop Asian hate: https://anti-asianviolenceresources.carrd.co/
