I Come From Foreign

I finished reading The Brief Wondrous Life of Oscar Wao by Junot Diaz one whole day before it won a Pulitzer last week.

Coincidence?

The main character is an overweight sci-fi geek and overall poor excuse for a Dominican male. For those who don’t know–and here I thank all my Latin American friends for informing me–the stereotype of the Latin lover applies one-million-fold to Dominican men. Cheaters, lovers, sex addicts–they just can’t get enough of women in any shape or form.

Poor Oscar.

He couldn’t get enough of women, too–but only in his head. His first kiss didn’t come until he was 23, right before the end of his brief and wondrous life. And it wasn’t for lack of trying. My boy got shot down more times than he read The Lord of the Rings trilogy. Did I mention he was a sci-fi geek?

Anyway, my point is that on top of desperately seeking love and having it avail him at every corner, Oscar had to deal with his absolute failure to live up to the legendary Cassanova skills supposedly bestowed upon all Dominican men. Not to mention the pity (and disgust) of his Dominican family in New Jersey who couldn’t figure out just what went wrong with this one.

So, here are the things that recommended me to Oscar Wao.

• Our chubby woebegone protagonist, Oscar, was a writer–prolific actually–but ultimately unsuccessful in ever getting his sci-fi published. That actually makes him a better man than me–I am deathly afraid to put pen to paper to write anything resembling fiction, my passion. One of my favourite themes in fiction, which you’ll be hearing a lot more about, is the writer and what goes into that torturous creative process.
• It’s about a Dominican family living in foreign (Disclaimer: their situation is a lot different from mine. They live in a Dominican enclave in Jersey where there are people just like them everywhere they turn. There’s a large enough population that they have an identity within the community. I, on the other hand, am probably one of less than 50 Trinis spread out over the greater Los Angeles area. Nonetheless, they are foreigners in a strange land having to deal with the pull of home and the opportunities only available in America and so I can relate. Also, I have a couple friends from DR and visited there three years ago so it’s always nice to read about places you’re already familiar with.)
• Our Oscar is the anti-stereotype. Whatever perception you had of a Dominican male, he was the opposite. No machismo. No game. No experience. No luck, whatsoever. He’s an anti-hero who ends up dying a real hero’s death. That intrigued me.

So let’s talk stereotypes.

When you’re living in foreign, you have to deal with breaking down stereotypes on a daily basis.

I, for one, in no way fit the typical Trinidadian (or Caribbean, for that matter) stereotype.

First of all, I’m Chinese (for the most part–another post for another time), an ethnic group that represents less than one percent of the population. (Trinidad is about 40 percent Indian, 40 percent black, 18 percent mixed, and two percent white, Syrian/Lebanese, and Chinese)

The number one question I get when meeting a new person here in foreign is:

You’re Asian? But how can that be? You’re from Trinidad.

or

You’re not black. You can’t be from Trinidad.

Uh derrrrrrrrrr….

I guess it kind of figures.

In my experience, most Americans who aren’t white or black aren’t considered “American” anyway.

I try not to be snippy though. Try. But I don’t apologize about not living up to the afro-caribbean, dreadlock wearing, spliff-smoking, barefoot, beach-living stereotype.

No way, “mon.”

Usually I try to put it in context:

You know how America has immigrants from all different places all around the world?

Well, Trinidad is kind of like that.

They still look at me quizzically but at least I’ve given them something to ponder.

On top of that, I’ve about 3/4 way lost my accent.

I can pick it back up like that when I’m around my fellow West Indians (or when I’m vex) but somehow when I’m in a room full of Americans all of a sudden I’m pronouncing my Rs (WAH-derrr, not woh-TUH) losing my Ts (FIF-dy, not fif-TAY) and rounding out my vowels (Dehn-YELL, not DAAHN-yelI) and I kinda want to kick myself.

So I look Asian and I speak American. I couldn’t possibly be foreign.

(I also don’t drink so there goes another one but I’ve already discussed that here.)

I wonder what’s worse. Feeling like an outsider or being one and having people mistaken for you for a local?

Therein lies the rub.

Sometimes I actually enjoy it, though. It makes me feel all exotic and different–definitely a departure from my regular self perception.

And it’s a story to tell.

Now, I am a terrible storyteller. I can write but speaking is an entirely different skill.

I’ve gotten better about it, though.

When you’ve been telling the same story (or variations thereof) every time you meet a new person for the past eight years, you do improve.

So there is a lot of fun you can have with it.

I mean, I’m from this tiny little island in the Caribbean, that nobody should really know about except that there are so many talented people there accomplishing so many impressive things, from inventing new instruments, to pioneering new music genres, to winning Tony awards on Broadway (hmmm… see a pattern here?)

Not to mention two Nobel-Prize winning authors whom I will definitely be posting about soon. (see here and here and I’m also going to add him to the list because I want to post about The Lonely Londoners soon)

And if you don’t know about it then I have tons of fodder for conversation so it’s a win-win situation.

But then again, everybody’s country is famous for something.

So no matter where you’re from there’s a story to tell. You just have to find it.

When I first moved to the U.S. I definitely thought of myself as an ambassador, spreading the Trini doctrine to places far and wide.

Now that I’m in LA, where fewer people have reason to know about my country (geography is a bitch), I guess I should pick that back up.

I’m by no means the most knowledgeable about Trinidadian history and culture–I pretty much know what was around me growing up and I grew up pretty sheltered. Really sheltered, actually.

On top of that, my memories have gotten cloudy with time. (Like I had to look up to make sure I was getting my percentages on the ethnic breakdown of T’dad correct–I actually thought there would be more of me than that)

So maybe I should bone up.

Maybe I’ll make that a goal.

Danielle, Trini Ambassador for the West Coast, widening perspectives and breaking down stereotypes one conversation at a time…

Are you a blonde-haired, blue-eyed Latin American? A Jew from Kentucky? How do you deal with people’s misperceptions of who you are and where you’re from?

Share your stories!