I had never been aware of my identity as a minority as much as I have in the last year. My freshman year of college has been a huge year in terms of how I identify myself. Western is a great place to be and a wonderful place to meet friends; however, it has made me realize I need to identify myself in a way I have not yet experienced.
The reality of my time in college is that I am a small percentage of the minority population on my campus, let alone my classes. It has, and is, still taking a long time to adjust to the fact that there are not many people with the same background as me.
I grew up in a very diverse culture, including a range of people from very different backgrounds. I lived in Tacoma, Wash., for most of my life, which is about two and a half hours away from Bellingham. It exposed me to many different cultures and lifestyles I could not find if I lived in an area that had the same race and background of people.
In middle school, I was fortunate enough to live on a different continent and get the time to have a new perspective on life. It brought me to the realization that in order to have a thriving and successful population, you must have a variety of people living together and learning to adapt and harmonize together. I went to an international school for three years that exposed me to so many people from all over the entire world. It helped me develop an equalized way of thinking and brought me to the realization that you learn better when you have different people in a classroom working together. You cannot just be in a sort of education that is occupied by just one group of people.
Before coming to Western, I identified myself as a photographer, an artist, and a singer. I identified myself as someone, as me. Coming to Western, I have identified myself as someone who is different, someone who looks and thinks differently than others. I came to that realization when I walked into my very first college class only to find I was the only minority in that class. I was the only non-white student, and it felt so strange to me. I cannot even put into words what that felt like. Throughout that first week of going to my classes, I saw I was the only minority/non-white student in about three out of my four classes. Growing up in very, very diverse places and going to diverse schools, this realization put me in shock. I was always aware I was different and looked different growing up, but until I was put in so many classrooms and a predominately white campus, I was faced with the realization that I was identified by what I looked like rather than who I was on the inside.
During my meeting with my RA, the subject we talked about this quarter was social identity. My RA is half white and half black, so she understood the predicament of how I felt to look different than others on campus. She told me that she usually plays a game in her head to spot as many people that look like her in a period of time just to see what the outcome is. One day when she was sitting in front of the Viking Union for four hours. She decided this would be the perfect place to just play this game as the Viking Union is the most popular spot on the Western campus. Over five hours, five African-American students passed her. It was a situation that stuck with me after our conversation, and it made me think about the place that I was living in. Being one of the only Asian residents on the ridge in Beta made me realize I am going to be different. In classrooms, on campus, around Bellingham; in everyday life at college.
I think that anyone who is different is going to think in ways that make them aware of so many aspects of their life and how people perceive them. The fact of the matter is, I have a lot to learn in a place where I look different.
