Week 1: Who Are We, Who Am I?

The Asian American identity, or is it the Asian-American identity, is there even a difference? Growing up as a Filipino immigrant, I have personally never identified with either of these terms. I am a Filipino. I immigrated to the United States of America when I was 5 years old and nearly my entire family was born in the Philippines, so what part of myself could possibly be considered American?  

There’s a certain feeling of discomfort when filling out applications for schools or scholarships and I am forced to list my ethnicity as “Asian/Asian American,” it feels like I am having a mini identity crisis every time. I grew up in a predominantly Hispanic and Black community, I was only surrounded by a handful of other Southeast Asians and an even smaller amount of Filipinos, yet I never really felt out of place. Of course, there were times that I was a bit embarrassed about bringing my chicken Adobo for lunch during my early years of public school education but I never felt that I didn’t belong in my community. Although I often came from a different country or origin than my peers I was able to find solace in my community’s struggle to achieve the “American Dream.” 

I grew up nearly my entire life surrounded by the same community, so one would expect me to receive a cultural shock as soon as I entered a huge university such as the University of California, Irvine (UCI), yet I didn’t; It wasn’t until June 14, 2022, Day 2 of the CAUSE retreat that I had felt this sense of not belonging.

As a group we did the “Life Map” activity where we shared 5-6 major life events and shared a very brief summary of our life’s stories. As some of my peers share their own amazing and interesting lives this feeling of belonging continued to slip through my fingers. I have been surrounded by people who may have different ethnicities and racial backgrounds as I do, yet I have always shared the same struggle with my peers. Even at UCI, it was fairly easy for me to find people who also share similar hardships as I do, yet in a room full of people who identify as Asian or Asian American/Asian-American it was hard for me to feel at ease, like I belonged. 

Yet, I think this is what makes the AAPI community such a unique and beautiful experience. We have all come from different hardships, different struggles, different food and languages, different religions, etc. Some ethnicities may have absolutely nothing in common with another ethnicity of the AAPI community, yet we are able to put our differences aside and stand together as a community in both the political and social sphere and everything in between. My fellow peer Annie brought up a crucial point during her Life Map: whether we identify as “Asian” or “Asian American” or even “Asian-American” we are all in the same fight.