This morning, the Today show did a segment on foods from around the world. They highlighted one specific food item from each place.

Some of the places named: India, Scotland, and Africa.

I hope I’m not the only one who finds this problematic.

I am a registered nurse and always get told that I speak English so well. I was born in Australia and I am of Filipino background. I don’t think about my appearance until a patient or their family member points it out and they are quite amazed/baffled that someone who appears Asian “speaks so well” and could be considered a “real Australian.” The number of people I want to slap is unbelievable.

” Yes, I understand you’re Asian Australian, but where are you really from?”

You don’t sound Chinese to me.

Photographer to me, as I get ready for my senior portrait.

I mispronounce a lot of words because my parents moved to America 30 years ago but still speak with an accent, so I picked it up from them. My friends always make fun of me and say I’m a bad American.

I am age 20, born in America but raised in South Florida in a multicultural city. My parents are from Peru. It made me feel unaccepted and like I didn’t truly belong in either country.

Awkward Privilege, by Michael Cuauhtémoc Martínez

You are alienating me because you’re not speaking in English.

Said to me by a U.S. born acquaintance after a friend and I were having a personal conversion in our native language.

During class, a professor asked me at what age I began my schooling in the U.S.  I am a Hispanic male, born, raised, and fully educated in the U.S.  I cleared my throat and stated that I completed all of my education it in the United States.  She continued to lecture. It made me feel ambivalent.

I SAID A NORMAL NAME……AMERICAN!!

Someone asking for help naming a character on Yahoo! Answers. Made me annoyed, despondent.

Watching the pilot of “The Next Food Network Star,” a young chef who happens to have a Mexican heritage cooks French food. The judges advise her that she should cook Mexican food instead. LIKE HER NATIONALITY IS ALL SHE HAS TO OFFER. Made me feel like I will never be more than what you see.