by Dora Gelerinter
My fingers skirt over the keyboard keys,
Clicking through as quickly as possible.
My mind is running on one track,
Chinese test, Chinese test, Chinese test
Is all I can think about. I know that tomorrow
The characters on the page will look like nothing more than sticks,
Random collections of lines,
Who the hell has the patience to memorize all of this?
I come across the demographic questions
On the Peer Health Exchange survey
A program that spent 8 hours talking about identity,
Expanding our worldview, deepening our acceptance.
I had learned so much.
I had felt even more PC than a bearded California quinoa farmer.
“What is your race,” the survey asks.
“Choose ONE,” it says.
So I click Mixed-Race, but there’s no little box at the end to specify.
So I click Asian, and the Mixed-Race option unclicks,
So I click Caucasian, and the Asian unclicks,
I frustratedly click back and forth,
Impossibly hoping the form will give in
Asian, Caucasian, Asian, Caucasian, Asian, Caucasian–
I give up.
Mixed-Race it is.
And I’m like, how is this helpful to your analytics?
Since when was “mixed-race” a category all its own?
I’m a mutt, and that’s all you care to know.
The next day it happens again,
Another form halfheartedly submitted
A girl on the escalator hands me a birthright Israel flyer.
She must have seen my curly hair.
She must have seen past the labels of “different,” “strange,” “other,”
And thought, “Jewish.”
I smile at her and take the flyer.
A couple days later, an elderly man with a cane
Asks me for the time as we cross paths on the sidewalk.
I rummage around for my phone.
“2:13,” I tell him.
“2?” he says. “Chinese?”
“Yeah.”
“How long you been in America?”
“My whole life.”
“You got a boyfriend?”
I’m already speed walking away.
Wednesday rolls around again, and I’m back in Chinese class.
We get our tests back. I’d forgotten how to write the word “car.”
Next we recite self-introductions.
“My name is 蒋芳蓉,” I say.
“芳” was given to me by my mother.
“蒋” and “蓉” were given to me by my Chinese program director.
My teacher stops me.
“That’s a little weird,” she says. “Just pick one.”
So I say my parents gave me my full Chinese name, even though it’s not true.
She stops me again.
“But then your proctor is going to think you’re Chinese, and judge your Chinese more harshly.”
“Just say your Chinese name was given to you.”
I take a deep breath.
I introduce myself one last time.
