* * *
When they got pregnant with me a few years later, they decided to stay in America for a better life for their daughter . . . for me.
* * *
Despite having other first-generation friends in the small town outside Philadelphia where I grew up, I still spent much of my childhood and adolescence wanting to look like the “norm” (blond or brown hair with blue eyes).
* * *
I wanted to be American SO bad. I knew I was American in theory, but I wanted to be American American.
* * *
I made it my job to teach my parents everything they needed to know about how to be “American parents.”
* * *
for example:
For dinner, I instructed them to make classic American foods like mac and cheese, meat loaf, and mashed potatoes, not noodles with fish balls or roasted duck that they bought hanging in some window.
* * *
I totally love eating with chopsticks, but sometimes I wanted them to let me eat with a fork and knife too.
* * *
When we would go out to restaurants, I asked them not to order a side of white rice to go with everything and made them throw away the to-go containers at home instead of using them over and over again.
* * *
On Easter, I explained how to buy an Easter-egg dyeing kit from the store, boil the eggs, and dip them in food coloring so they could hide them in the backyard. It seemed weird to them to do anything with an egg other than fry it and put it over rice, but I promised them we’d have fun!
* * *
I begged them to pack a turkey sandwich in my school lunch instead of leftover Thai curry so I didn’t have to hear all the kids ask, “What’s that smell?”
* * *
On Halloween, I asked if they could give normal store-bought candy to the trick-or-treaters instead of White Rabbit candy from the Asian grocery store or homemade desserts like dried mango or sticky rice.
* * *
On Christmas, I thanked them for always working so hard to provide for us, but told them they still had to give Santa credit for all the toys they bought us.
* * *
On Thanksgiving, I said, “I know you want to eat Thai food for Thanksgiving ’cause it’s the best food. But can we please make a turkey with all the fixings just this one time?”
* * *
When school was closed for the holidays, I explained that none of the other kids were doing extra tutoring sessions or bonus homework.
* * *
I must have said a million times, “An A minus is still really good, I promise!”
* * *
When my friends came over, I gently guided my parents into understanding that they aren’t being nosy if they ask my friends about themselves and their families. But I never expected them to remember all my friends’ American names!
* * *
I begged them to relax their “no sleepovers before the age of fifteen” rule. I promised I’d be good and that my friends’ parents would always be watching us.
* * *
I convinced them that playing sports would be good for us, that we wouldn’t get hurt, and we needed to exercise more than just our brains.
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I agreed to go to Thai school on the weekends, but informed them I would not be meeting my Thai husband there!
* * *
But the older I got, the less I “parented” my parents about how to be an American.
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I found myself less embarrassed about my love of Thai food and even wanted to share it with my friends.
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I realized I had a strong desire to learn my parents’ language better—and not because they made me.
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I realized the best part of ME is how I stood out from the crowd.
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I no longer wanted to be like everyone else.
* * *
I wanted to be my Thai-American self, who stood out because of my parents and what they gave me—an incredible work ethic, and an amazing culture, rich in stories and traditions that NO ONE ELSE will have in the exact same way ever.
PHOTO BY LIZA KOSHY
Liza Koshy, actress and entertainer, is most well-known for creating comedy skits and characters within her social network of more than forty million fans. She is the star of the YouTube original Liza on Demand, Hulu’s Freakish, and host of MTV’s reboot of TRL. Raised in Houston, Texas, as the youngest of three daughters, Liza is a dedicated sister, daughter, friend, and advocate for mental health.
Liza Koshy
SOMETIMES WHEN I TELL certain circles of people that I grew up in Houston, Texas, they get a pitying look on their face and say, “Ohhh, wowww, so you must have had to deal with a lot of racism growing up. . . .”
They give me those sad, knowing eyes, crinkling up their noses in a concern-troll kinda way, like they really feel for me and my brown skin. Then they keep going.
“I mean, you know, since you’re . . .” They pause, considering my ethnicity, realizing they’ve just backed themselves into a corner. Because they have no idea what I am.
“Since you’re . . . well . . . Wait, what are you? Where are your parents from? Are you Mexican?”
I am brown. And people have no idea why. It must be very stressful for them. But I like being racially ambiguous. Forever the ethnically mysterious little brown girl. People have mistaken me for being Polynesian, Puerto Rican, Mexican, Brazilian . . . the list goes on and on. And people aren’t wrong to be confused. I mean, I do look a little bit like I’m from . . . the whole entire world.
My own hair doesn’t know what I am. It is dark and curly and sometimes I wake up with a morning Afro. And even though my skin is mostly brown, it is also very, very white in all the places where the sun doesn’t shine. My father immigrated here from Kerala, India, when he was sixteen. And my mother is a white lady from Virginia. He is dark chocolate, she is white chocolate, and I am their smooth milk chocolate. I am biracial, but growing up in the humble Houston suburb of South Braeswood made me so much more.
I consider myself extremely fortunate because South Braeswood was one of the most racially integrated places I’ve ever experienced. I grew up around equal numbers of Mexican kids, African-American kids, white-blond Baptist kids, white dark-haired Jewish kids, Asian kids, and, yes, even Indian kids. And we were all friends.
It was a place where people like my parents could thrive. Their love wasn’t forbidden or difficult. No Romeo and Juliet drama for them. They got together and had three biracial kids—and they didn’t struggle to equally share their white and Indian cultures with us. Even though my mother’s church was Mennonite, which I’m thinking is about as white as they come, she was also a yoga teacher with Asian and Latino best friends. She loved Indian food and made our home into a baroque sanctuary of Indian culture with Indian carpets and artifacts from my dad’s background. She raised me to appreciate a good white-dad joke, and we regularly ate both corn on the cob and curry. But she didn’t push anything on me either. She never insisted that I share in her obsession with the ancient Indian yoga practice, but rather, let me twerk at dance practice. She was visionary enough to let me come to the realization on my own that I can’t twerk. Because, as I learned, there’s a big difference between having a “butt” and a “booty.” And I have neither.
Anyway, as much as it may surprise some non-Texans, my friends and I didn’t struggle with our ethnic identity as much as we had fun with it.
Every now and then, a well-meaning person on the street would ask my mother if I was adopted from Mexico. Because she and I don’t look much alike. My parents thought this assumption was funny and called me their adopted Mexican daughter. My whole life.
Then they doubled down on their Mexican-child joke and sent me to a Spanish-immersion school where I learned to speak fluent Spanish as a child. That’s a proud Texan right there. I can speak it better than some of my Texas-born Hispanic friends. My parents used to
take the whole family to Mexican restaurants, where the waiters and cooks were from Mexican backgrounds, and insisted that I order for everyone in Spanish. You might assume my dad would have pushed me to learn his native tongue, Malayalam, so I could understand more about him and his upbringing, but instead he poured all his resources into looking like a baller when ordering enchiladas.
I wasn’t the only butt of my parents’ jokes. One of my sisters looks more Indian than the rest of us, so my parents gave her the most Indian-ass name they could think of. Rahel. But me and my other sister are named Elizabeth and Olivia. Way to be discreet, Mom. Rahel looks a lot like one of my Indian aunties, so my parents always used to joke that Rahel actually belonged to my aunt and they were just borrowing her. My other sister, Olivia, looks Polynesian, so naturally when we were on vacation in Hawaii, my parents kept joking that we were only there to look for Olivia’s real parents.
My parents aren’t cruel or weird. They’re just funny. And a little bit weird, I guess. But we all looked different enough from one another that we had to have a sense of humor about it. Even my white grandfather used to call me his coffee-colored grandchild. There was such a mix of colors and cultures in my life, none of this seemed odd. As a kid, my two best friends were (1) a half-French, half-Thai kid named Francois, and (2) a half-Jewish, half-Argentinian friend name Bessita. In the school lunchroom I was just as likely to be found eating with the white kids (who ate PB&Js and Slim Jims with handwritten notes from their moms on their napkins) as I was to be found eating with the Indian kids (who used their hands to shove last night’s chicken curry down their throats). But most of the time I was eating with the Hispanic kids, who were eating collard greens, or the black kids, who were eating tamales. We did a lot of food trades.
My parents, with all their jokes and quirks, set the best possible example for me, making me comfortable with people of all backgrounds. In our little corner of Texas, culture and race felt fluid, natural, and fun. I experienced so many different religions, races, and cultures as part of my everyday life. It truly wasn’t ever too stressful or confusing. Except when I had to fill out the forms and figure out which box to check.
Caucasian? Not entirely.
Asian? Hmmm. Well, India is in Asia.
Where was the box for “mixed”? Where was the box for me? Probably in the same place as that box my real parents shipped me in from Mexico.
See, even I can’t get too serious about it.
I’ve usually been able to shrug off any identity confusion, because I had such chill parents and was surrounded by so many accepting families of different backgrounds. Sometimes my friends and I would casually reference each other’s heritage in a way that people in other times and places might even think of as racist. For example, one of my really close white friends used to give me spices for Christmas. In another time and place, people might have thought this was a stereotypical gift to give an Indian—to the point of being reductive, rude, and racist. But to me, I was just psyched to get my hands on some fresh turmeric. One year, I was lucky enough to get curry powder.
Another time, I was showing some of my girlfriends pictures of my cousin’s wedding. She was a spectacular, gorgeous Indian bride, complete with flowing red sari, bangin’ beadwork, henna tattoos for days, flawless eyeliner, and a stunning, sparkling tikka draped around her head that dangled a beautiful string of gems down the center of her forehead.
We were talking specifically about the tikka and one of my friends said, “Yo, that ding-a-ling looks dope!”
I didn’t even think twice about the tikka being called a ding-a-ling. Nothing offensive about that to me. Seriously. I didn’t really know the proper name for the ding-a-ling either. I just had to google it right now for this essay. We never felt that we had to say stiff things like “I appreciate your cultural attire.” We felt free to compliment it in our own way, with our own words. We were a generation of mixed-race kids who felt comfortable being curious. We always brought respect and love to our conversations.
As a teenager, I spent every Friday for four years straight with my dance team. Just like my neighborhood and my school, there were girls of every color and background on our squad, and I was the captain. The team was fifty shades of brown, and beautiful. Before every football game, we’d spend hours together doing our hair and makeup so we looked as fly as possible on the bus ride to the game. The time spent getting ready was the best. We’d trade off whose music we’d listen to, and which kind of dance we’d do to impress one another. Sometimes it was pure rap. The utmost ratchetry going down. We’d throw on a beat and make our own awful raps or throw ass to Drake. Other nights it was emo rock, lip-synching to Fall Out Boy. Then we’d eat tacos while listening to Tim McGraw country music—or grab Mexican-sushi fusion at our favorite restaurant, Japaneiro’s. Our music and our food choices were just like us. Mixed! Everyone was always introducing their favorite music and foods to the rest of the team, and everyone loved what everyone else was sharing.
I know I am making it sound like we were one big beautiful rainbow with butterflies and candy sprinkles. But we kinda actually were. I had it pretty good. I know not everyone out there has the experience I had. But it wasn’t all unicorns and cookie poops. There was that one angsty moment in my teenage years when I felt a little confusion and disappointment in my heritage. It happened when all my friends started having their special “becoming a woman” ceremonies, and I realized my culture had no such thing. I was envious as hell.
First there were the bat mitzvahs when my Jewish friends started turning thirteen. These kids ball out for their thirteenth birthdays. DJs. Magicians. Buffets and buffets and buffets of food. Chocolate fountains. Not just one. But maybe three per party. Ice sculptures in the likeness of the birthday girl’s face. I’ve yet to ever have a party that good in my entire damn life. For a minute, I was pretty jealous of my friend Zoey Katz and was strongly considering becoming Jewish.
And then, as we got a little older, all my Hispanic friends were having their quinceañera celebrations for their fifteenth birthdays. I wanted one so badly for myself. I was usually the most excited guest at the party. When Alondra, Yadira, and Yajaira turned fifteen, I would turn up. I wanted that big sparkly ball gown and tiara. I wanted the satiny shoes, the shiny ribbons, and the delicate princess pillows they kneeled on while they prayed. I was thrilled when I got to be on Alondra’s court of honor. I presented her the ring at the ceremony and watched with misty eyes as they gave her the muneca—a ceremonial doll symbolizing the transition into womanhood. Basically, they were giving her permission to stop playing with dolls and start wilin’ out with an entourage of her closest friends right behind her. What could be better than that? Your whole community giving you the pass into the good life?! I was always the last one to leave the dance floor at the reception, salsa dancing and singing in Spanish with someone’s uncle. All told, I attended over a dozen quinceañeras in my life. I even performed a dance at one. It was the closest I ever got to being celebrated like I thought I deserved.
I wanted to be a part of these ceremonies. Where was my symbolic doll, my chocolate fountain, my womanhood?
There was nothing my Mennonite-n-Curry family was going to do to help me out, so I decided I was just going to have to figure it out for myself. I would throw my own party. I got real creative one day after watching another rerun of MTV’s My Super Sweet 16 and decided my ceremony would be called My Spicy 16. You know. Spicy. Because I’m Indian. And Indian girls get to celebrate their womanhood too!
I went crazy with the theme. I decided that when I became a lady, it was going to involve mad coconuts. Which aren’t spicy, I know. But they are very prominent in Indian food, and I happen to love them. My mother made coconut curry, and my white grandmother found a recipe for a delicious coconut cake. We had coconut macaroons, and I even wore a coconut bra. Because nothing says “I’m a woman now” like having tropical fruit shells hold up your lady biscuits. I’m sure the rabbis and priests at my friends
’ bat mitzvahs and quinceañeras would have gasped at my outfit. Alondra looked like a princess on her big day, and Zoey looked like a proper little lady. I just looked like a low-rent Moana. But I never felt more excited to share my big moment in a culturally fun way with my friends.
Because I kind of sprung this on my parents, we didn’t have an all-out rager like my friends got to have. It was a modest festival of coconuts, held at my house, and I invited just a few of my closest friends. There was one white girl, one Hispanic girl, one mixed girl, and an Asian guy. They were all there to celebrate my womanhood, to raise me up as a beautiful graceful Indian adult. I imagined them gathering around me to admire my coconut bikini, and congratulate me for my new attitude as a spicy young lady. They were such good friends. All of them would be by my side and would cheer me on, ready to get coconuts.
Except, as it turns out, three of the four of them were allergic to coconut.
And I had no idea of their allergies until they showed up and saw that literally nothing on the menu was coconut-free. It was a complete fail. One of them sneezed on my coconut boobs. My mom had to order pizza, and I ate the coconut cake all by myself. It wasn’t glamorous or chocolate-fountain-like. There was even some talk of my coconut bra being a potential hazard to the white girl whose coconut allergy was especially fierce. So I had to remove my costume and just changed into my sad unisex pants that wouldn’t offend anyone’s food sensitivities. For a minute, I thought I was doomed to welcome my womanhood with very little fanfare. I was so sad.
American Like Me Page 10
