Asian American & Pacific Islander month happens in May and It made me think back on all the experiences I had as an Asian American. This includes the positive and negatives moments of my life! One thing for sure was that through out the whole thing I learned to appreciate who I am.
This reminds me of the time in my life where I went to a full-white school, seriously not single person of color in sight. I was only in kindergarten at the time, I didn’t know why. But all I know is that I felt a sudden pull, where I felt like I needed to be more similar to the people around me. I tried my best to speak English & only speak English, a matter of fact. I tried to forget all attempt of connecting with my culture causing me to have sparce knowledge of my language till this day.
Now, looking back on what I’ve learned this month, It was quite hard for people to accept who they are. Like in an article I read, The Long History of Racism Against Asian-Americans in the U.S. that it took a very long time for us, Asian Americans to even get representation in media. When we did though it was still a very bad representation of us. I believe without the effort of Asian Americans before me I wouldn’t be able to feel the way I do about my culture now.

Now, that I think about it, it’s just been a long war of us trying to prove ourselves in America. As shown, in the graphic novel, They Called Us Enemy, we see the deep, ingrained racism that Japanese AMERICANS faced during WWII. This shows that it doesn’t matter if you’ve been an American for who knows how long. You’d be discriminated just because you share the same race as the what they refer to as the “enemy”. Till this day, Asian Americans or POC in general have been fighting for place in society.