Priyal Patel | 21 | she/her | nationality: Indian| ethnicity: Hindu
“Yellow”.
Yellow face(in similar tones as black face), Chinesepeople,
although all this comes from american media
In my country, yellow has no such associations toany identity
This confused me so much earlier, as I didn't thinkthey looked yellow
from any angle, and I even researched about any randombouts of
yellow fever which might have occured there whichled to this
terminology
But I found none
And it was really confusing and enraging.
“Asian”.
From my personal experiences and all the other observationsfrom
media and other interactions as well;
The thing that separates Asians is the family structure,which combines
our unique culture, the strictness of various traditions,and even the
peculiar rituals and superstitions that we might carry
To the question of who all are allowed to call themselvesasians;
I don't think that's such a hardcore issue, nobodycan deny you the
right to call yourself whatever you want. People wererejoicing for
Kamala Harris being an Indian-american, even whenshe hasn't lived in
India ever, and that's completely fine. There's notany test someone
needs to pass to be considered a part of any community,asians, as all
others are pretty accepting of those in that regard.
What brings us together I guess is rooted in the samethings that
makes asians unique
Whenever I talk to some fellow Indian who's studyingin canada, let's
say, we'll end up talking about how american and canadianfood does
not have any masala in it(food is a pretty importantaspect actually), or
how people don't visit their family as much, or don'thave strict house
rules like Indian households too.
Ethnicity|part1.
Whenever I hear the word ethnicity
The first thought that strikes up is colour. Lokehow American media
segregate ethnic people to what the color of theirskin is. Or how they
would watch any asian wearing their traditional costumesand being
called 'ethnic' and 'exotic'
There's absolutely nothing wrong with it, just thatit has somehow
distorted my personal view.
Here in India, you could see such deep roots westerninfluence, that the
times that we wear our own traditional Indian clothes,we call them
'ethnic' too. There are events in our schools andoffices described as
ethnic/traditional days where you're supposed to wearnormal Indian
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