Guatemalan Roots

One of my kids (well, not my kid) cleared up a matter today that he seemed to have been mulling over for a while. Given that I am brown and apparently Chinese looking (I don’t see it), people here are often puzzled as to how I can be an American. Through my time spent living and traveling abroad, I’ve found this confusion surrounding my ethnicity to be widespread and universal, so I am accustomed to fielding questions on the topic.

Marvin started off with a question I’ve answered a million times: “What country were you born in?”

“The United States.”

This answer did not provide the information he was looking for so he continued. “What is your mom’s name?”

“Janet.”

Still not enough. “What is your dad’s name?”

“Stan…like the hurricane that killed all those people in Guatemala.”

“Oh. Yes. Estan.”

I could tell that Marvin was still not satisfied with the information he had received, but I didn’t know where he was headed with this line of questioning. Then he continued with, “Where are your parents?”

“They’re in the states.”

“But where were they before?”

“Before? I don’t get it. Before what?”

Finally Marvin’s brother Brian chimed in to get to the heart of the matter. “He thinks that your parents are from Tactic, and that they went mojado [illegally] to the United States and had you there, and then you came back to work in Tactic because you’re really Guatemalan. Is that true?”

Hmm. I should have just said yes.