Nobody knows what I am

I'm referring to ethnic ambiguity. When you're half Japanese and half white, you could very well get away with being any race depending on the context.

I know my existence confuses people. We meet and their eyes attempt to process exactly what they see, but it's difficult because I share traits with both the east and west sides of the world. If I'm surrounded by white Europeans then I'm Chinese, which was demonstrated to me by a girl who, ten minutes after meeting me, asked, "So where are you from? China?" I was taken aback of course, being that my English had distinct traces of an American accent, but I was willing to overlook her automatic assumption. Afterall, there are only thirty seven countries in Asia, all of which possess a different nationality of people, so how could I blame her for picking the biggest one first.

Then, when I was in the United Arab Emerates, which is technically more Asia than Europe and yet still somewhere in between, I was once asked if I was "Red Indian." A quick image search in Google shows me only one picture of a female Red Indian:

Now, if there are two things to be learned from this, let it be these:

1. I do not look like that.

2. If Google has only one picture of a Red Indian, then it's highly unlikely that you've ever actually seen a Red Indian. Therefore, the only conclusion I can come up with is that I look so foreign to you that you feel the need to compare me to an endangered ethnic community.

But the most interesting verdict that people have come to is in some ways more sensical. In fact, this is the situation that happens most frequently. It usually begins with me talking to myself, saying something daft like, "I wish I were the niece of King Midas' second cousin from Japan so that I could turn everything I touch into rice... God, I'm so Asian." At the mention of me being Asian, conversation will stop, all heads will turn and someone will bravely ask, "You're Asian?"

This is the part of the story where time freezes and I feel the need to reassess who I am, where I am and who exactly these people are. Yes, I'm Asian, I'm in my apartment and I obviously don't know these people well enough. At this point I can clarify the misunderstanding by asking, "Of course I'm Asian, what did you think I was?"

The answer they give is brilliant: Hawaiian. "I've never seen anybody from Hawaii before so I just assumed you were Hawaiian." And you have to admit, that makes a lot of sense. How is anyone supposed to know that there's a distinct difference between me and a true, ethnic Hawaiian? How are they supposed to know that I am the epitome of straight-up Haole? If not Hawaiian, then what else could I be?

The truth is that there's no way to know. Chalk me up to being a half breed, a mutt, whatever you can think of and I'll take it as long as it still retains some semblance to what I actually am: JapaneseGermanIrishScottishWelsh.

Okay fine, just Hapa.