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| Playing mini golf on our vacation back in Chicago |
I want to begin by mentioning that I am not
for one to really post anything political or social/cultural issues to avoid
the awkwardness of opinions that turn into arguments or rants to try to change
another person’s point of view. Everything I’m about to say is based on my
observation and opinion, nothing on research or sources. With that would like to talk about interracial
relationships.
I know that back then it was definitely
forbidden/frowned upon if not all cultures then most cultures. Then through the years as the U.S. grew and
immigration became larger to create America, couples in different cultures
became more involved. Can’t say that it didn’t take some bloodshed or some
family feuds at first, but people got through them some how. The reason I bring
this up is, my husband and I have realized that since we’ve been together we
have noticed a lot of the public looking at us. I don’t mean a smile and wave
or a greeting saying how cute we are. I’m talking about faces of confusion,
mean glares and even disgust toward us as we are out in about. We both have
noticed it before but never really talked about it until recently.
Honestly,
I’m not mad at them or angry. I’m mostly just sad, that in 2014 there are still
these little matters of race as an issue between two people. The surprising
thing is, its not just pointed to one specific type of race that has been
giving us “looks,” because it’s been a mix of everyone. Grand it has been more
of Caucasian and Asian people that have been giving us these stares. I think
the most hurtful day was when my husband and I went to get our car washed.
After we paid we sat down to wait until our car was finished and this older
man sitting across from us gave a mean stare and made this uneasy grunting
disgust noise. The better person in me held back any courage I had to stand up
and yell at him for being so disrespectful to us. Instead we drove home and
that’s when we brought up the question of interracial relationships.
I know that
in my culture, in the Philippines, there is still some bitterness into cross
relationships with other countries then our own. Most of it is really just
frowned upon the old old generations of our culture. Now a days the Filipino
culture is much more open with others especially to people here in America. The
most common match ups that I’ve seen in interracial couples between them are
Filipino-Caucasian, Filipino-African American (even though older generations
really frown upon blacks the most, because of reputation), and
Filipino-Filipino. I’ve never had a preference on a person; I think that even
if I were to still live in the Philippines I still would feel the same as I do
now. If I didn’t marry my husband now and I was back there, because of the
environment I would be around I would most likely wind up with someone who is
also Filipino. Growing up here I was attracted to other Asian guys, the thing
was that they were interested in “white girls” (or so it seemed). I believe
this was so because Asian guys thought that the girls were interested in
“white guys.” For this to happen I have no idea or what the concept of this is, it’s
just how I’ve perceived it, especially walking in the halls of high school.
To the
pressing matter, again I’m not angry I’m more upset and sad, a bit confused. I
know my husband probably feels the same way. It really doesn’t affect us unless
they start to hurt one of us or criticizes obnoxiously in public. Honestly, I never thought I would run into this type of problem with us being together, but it really still is out there. It just would
be nice if we could go out in public and not have someone judge us with his or
her face. No matter what anyone will say to us. I love Michael, not because of
his skin or his status but because he’s the person I picked out of anyone in
the world. All he had to do was smile and show me his heart.
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| Us about 3 weeks ago at a Bruno Mars concert in my hometown, Chicago |
