Checking the “Race” Box
My heritage told to a twelve-year-old boy
I am a counselor in the year 2021 and the children that I work with have been absorbing a lot of hatred and confusion over the course of the last year. One of my clients is a twelve-year-old boy in the sixth grade and he repeated an awful statement that I can only assume that he heard from his family or social media that “Asian people are not human.” I was appalled by his statement, but more so, I was ashamed of our society for planting these atrocious thoughts in his mind.
I am half Asian, though when you look at me you might not think it — I suppose that is part of the Indian plight. My conversation with this twelve-year-old client sparked a desire in me to want to tell the story of my heritage and urge this student to understand more about the world that we share with one another. The only way to change things, I believe, is through education.
What Is Heritage?
Heritage is a word that has always felt rich and elusive to me. When people meet me, they often ask me what race I am, but the answer I prefer to give is one about my heritage. Racially, my identity is mixed. There are somewhere between four or five races that have come together to create the genetic makeup that I carry with me throughout life. But most of the time when people ask me that age-old question, “what are you?” they aren’t really interested in hearing the lengthy novel that is my story.
People want to hear the short answer. They want you to check the “race” box on the formal document that is their mind and its judgment. They want you to resolve their confusion as quickly as possible, and I’m not here for that.
“What do you want to know about the world?”
I asked the twelve year old boy. He thought about it for a minute and then responded. “How many people are in the world?” The research said there were 7.9 billion, and the number is growing. “What’s on the opposite side of the U.S.?” He asked. And I pulled up a world map. Asia is about as far away as you could be from the Southern United States. We began looking at all of the countries and continents. I watched as he made connections about the history of our world. Then I told him about how colonial trade routes and colonization played a major role in my heritage.
I zoomed in on the map to show him the small island in the Caribbean. I told him about how the British owned the island and harvested the sugarcane plantations, previously established by the French. I explained to him that once the British abolished slavery (1838), they had to find alternative labor, and with their crown rule in India (1858), they began offering contract work to Indians, who had been experiencing poor economic conditions and famine. Many Indians signed up to leave their homes and travel to a place they had never been: Saint Vincent.
The first ship carrying indentured workers from India was called the Travancore. It departed from Madras on February 26, 1861, with 258 South Indians on board. It arrived at the western end of the Kingstown harbor on June 1, 1861. Today, the harbor is known as Indian Bay, in Saint Vincent, and it is where my father's ancestors began to establish their new home.
Displaced Indians
There are many displaced Indians all around the world whose ancestors left their homeland during the time when India was a territory of Britain. I remember when I was a kid reading about Gandhi and his anti-colonial non-violent efforts to campaign for India’s independence from British rule. It wasn’t until after Gandhi was assassinated in 1948 that India actually gained its independence and was established as the Republic of India in 1950.
Given that my ancestors left India over 100 years ago, I feel that the culture and heritage of my familial origins are forever changed. The culture of their new island life naturally impacted the South Indians after they moved — their Hinduism was replaced by Christianity, and their language became a dialect of English. This is not too different than the way that Pakistan separated from India and their religion became Islamic and the national language, Urdu, became a mixture of Persian, Arabic, and various local languages. It is similar to Hindi but written in Arabic script.
Anyway, back to me and my ancestors.
Saint Vincent is a volcanic island. I like to think that my family has incredible luck on their side because in 1902 the volcano, La Soufrière, erupted, killing 1,600 people. My great-grandfather was the only survivor from his family and the plantation on which he worked. His son — my grandfather (who I called Papa until he died in 2014), believed strongly in education and became the principal of a local school on the island. He and my grandmother worked hard to send each of their five children, one by one, to college away from the island.
Saint Vincent is an impoverished island, and my grandparents knew that their children would not have had as many options if they stayed there. Both of my grandparents are descendants of South India, and they met each other in the town where most of the Indians on the island lived: Richland Park. This is where my father was born and raised until he went to a college in Mexico. And then from there, he received a scholarship to attend medical school in the state of California, where he met my mother and thus began the hope of my existence. My father’s immigrant experience has been unique, to say the least.
Colonial America
My mother’s lineage is equally as complicated and wrapped up in colonial ties. The twelve-year-old boy was completely mind blown at this point, so I condensed the story — however, I would like to continue telling you the depth of it. My mother is racially more diverse than my father and is probably the most difficult to explain. However, the story begins with King Louis of France claiming a stake in what is now the state of Louisiana. My grandfather’s father was an African slave brought to Louisiana while either the French or Spanish were occupying the land. He married a Native American woman from the Choctaw Nation — making my grandfather both African and Native American.
My grandmother is half-black and half-white, to put it simply. Her mom was the daughter of a French man with the surname Taylor (of Taylor’s Bakery, est. 1913), who took two wives — one was a slave who gave birth to my great grandmother. My great grandfather, on the other hand, was the same mix — half-black and half-white — but it is unclear where he came from. Based on the history of this era, his mix was either Spanish, French, or Scottish and Black. They called him a blue devil because he had brown skin and blue eyes (a trait that has been passed down to other members of my family). The multi-racial mix of my grandmother is now known as Louisiana Creole, and from what I understand, it was pretty common for the European settlers to sleep with their black slaves.
Exploring this side of my heritage brings up a lot of mixed feelings both in myself and my family members. It is easier for me to just tell people that my mom is half black and half white rather than to go into this incredibly complicated story. My racial identity, as far as I claim, is Indian, Black, French, and Native American, with an asterisk because there could be more to the story.
I take a lot of pride in who I am and where my family has come from because they have found a lot of success in today's world despite this rough history. When my grandfather, who was the dark mix of African and Native American got my grandmother pregnant with my mom, there was some controversy because she was light-skinned, and had the chance of flying under the radar in white society. When my mother was born in Los Angeles, California, she attended segregated schools until the 14th Amendment was passed in the 1970s.
I grew up in a multiracial and culturally diverse home. My parents are wonderful and intelligent people who raised me to believe that I could do anything that I wanted because they themselves had overcome a number of obstacles stacked against them. I was aware of poverty from a young age, having lived in Saint Vincent and visiting frequently throughout my childhood. I never really understood until much later just how complicated my racial identity was. I was always confused when asked to “Check the Race Box” on formal documents. How could I choose just one? I have always wanted to claim all of my races because each part of my history has felt valuable and monumental to me.
In response to the racial hatred that has corrupted the outlook of numerous youth — we must make it stop. The twelve-year-old boy who made the horrible statement at the beginning of this article is opening his eyes to this world still, and we all need to do the same. Racial inequalities arose from power struggles and a quest for resources. We need to be able to see the consequences for what they are, objectively, and continue to mitigate the damage through education, patience, and compassion.
The Impact on a First Generation Multiracial
When I was in high school and my dad bought me my first car, it didn’t really occur to me how far my family had come, and I didn’t understand why my classmates judged and envied me for it. I remember one girl told me that she expected me to be “stuck up” because we looked like we had money, and this comment really shocked me. Today, as an adult in the professional world, I can truly understand how people must have seen us. But I also understand the value of money and education. I see clearly the story of my complicated heritage, lineage, and race. I see how my parents paved a new path for themselves that had nothing and yet everything to do with their race. My family is not perfect, but they had a dream of giving their children a life that they did not have when they were growing up.
As a counselor, I have brought social and emotional care to low socioeconomic communities in the name of justice and positive change. I know how the complexity of a diverse upbringing can impact people, and I hope that I can influence the culture and the social progress of our country for the better. Colonialism brought my family together and created me. It has also spread social and racial hierarchies (and hatred) in its path. Though many people resent the colonial influence, I try to see it for what it was: an effort to change the world — and I hope that the youth of today and tomorrow can live a better, more fair life, than those that preceded them.
It has always felt sacred and special to me that my brother and I had such a unique heritage. And when he died, I felt lonely in a way that I could never describe because of that uniqueness. I could not be more grateful or proud of my parents for who they are, where they came from, and how they raised me. I would not be who I am without my family — and no matter where I go next, they will continue to be my inspiration and my reason to do better, try harder, and make waves in this world. I come from a long line of survivors, and I intend to continue to be one of them.
