RECLAIM YOUR RIGHTS AS A CITIZEN OF HERE, HERE

by Michele Serros

ASKING HER WHERE SHE IS FROM.

I can’t get by one week without a white person asking me the Question:

“So, where are you from?”

“From Oxnard,” I answer.

“No, I mean originally.”

“Oh, Saint John’s Hospital, the old one over on F Street.”

“No, you know what I mean!”

No, what do you mean? And why is it important to you and why do you really need to know? When Latinos ask me where I’m from, it really doesn’t bother me. I can’t help but feel some sort of familiar foundation is being sought and a sense of community kinship is forming. “Your family’s from Cuernavaca? And what? They own the IHOP on Via San Robles? Wow, we really need to do lunch sometime!”

But when whites ask me the Question, it’s just a reminder that I’m not like them, I don’t look like them, which must mean I’m not from here. Here in California, where I was born, where my parents were born, and where even my great-grandmothers were born. I can’t help but feel that whites always gotta know the answer to everything. It’s like they’re uncomfortable not being able to categorize things they’re unfamiliar with, and so they need to label everything as quickly and neatly as possible. Sometimes when I’m asked the Question, I like to lie and make up areas within the Latin world from where I supposedly originated:

WHITE PERSON #1. So, where did you say you’re from?

ME.From Enchiritova, it’s actually a semipopulated islet off the coast of Bolivia.

WHITE PERSON #2. Yep! I knew it! I knew it! Kevin, didn’t I tell you I thought she was an Enchirito!

WHITE PERSON #1. Tag her!