Anomaly

Being in that 1% of America that falls outside the white/black/Hispanic/Asian racial paradigm has its downside, but it also has its ups. I mentioned before that I feel less racially conscious now than at any point since high school, and one of the great things about living in America is that here I feel like my own man, free of the racial baggage that I sense shouldering me in the GTA (where there are too many brown people for my liking!).

I think it’s because as a Canadian of Sri Lankan origin, I’m somewhat of a curiosity here. And there are some pluses to being in the miscellaneous category. It means that white Americans aren’t afraid of me because I’m not black; blue-collar folk don’t despise me because I’m taking away their jobs because I’m not Hispanic, and middle-class people don’t resent me because I’m stealing admission spots in the Ivy League and UC Berkeley because I’m not (East) Asian; and I’m too dark to be Arab, so the ignoramuses are not liable to think I’m a terrorist either.

In fact, most Americans aren’t quite sure what to make of me. And because they have such limited exposure to people like my own, I do feel that there is little to no preconceived prejudice because they have yet to be established, and I feel as if every interaction comes with a fresh, clean slate. I feel like I’m my own man.

And because for most Connecticut locals I’m one of the seldom few Canadians and seldom fewer brown people they’re liable to encounter in their lives, I almost feel like an ambassador to brown/Canadian humanity, and I feel compelled to do a public service for the brown community and Canadians alike. And so I go out of my way to appear polished and well-mannered, because I want that perception of people that look like me and share my citizenship to be positive. I want people to think “Canadians & brown people... they’re alright.”

I wish more minorities shared my mindset. The seldom few brown people here in Connecticut are mostly IT/H1B types (including a few I’ve seen in my building), and I perceive that there’s almost a cachet here to being brown – Americans stereotype that I’m shrewd, somewhat docile, good with computers, and unfailingly polite... although they’ll also assume I speak with an accent.

In Canada, I sense a different vibe. In the GTA and Surrey, BC in particular, there are way too many brown poser thugs running around thinking they’re ghetto, and these dipshits smear the rep of brown people as a whole. (And I live here with real disenfranchised African-Americans in the hood, and they ain’t half as bad.) Pull up your pants and stop appropriating an antagonistic culture that isn’t yours!

So as a brown kid in America, I am in a way a perpetual outsider, but IMO there is some good that comes with that.