Thoughts From a Teenage Girl: Mixed Race

Jasmine Schaper

“What did you think of me when we first met?” I once asked my friend while studying in the library

“I noticed that you were Asian,” they say casually, eyes never straying from the paper that needed to be submitted before 11:59pm.

I have other friends who are similar, who joke that my identifying trait is being Asian. This has been a pattern throughout my life: my white friends profiling me based on my non-European ancestry. Growing up in a little country town in Queensland, I was the designated Oriental among the crowd of Caucasian faces

I’m not complaining - there’s nothing wrong with light-hearted jokes between friends It’s just that there are times when I wake up in the morning, head groggy and eyes laced with sleep, and then the sudden realisation hits me: “oh my gosh, I’m Asian ” But I don’t feel Asian And I don’t think I ever will. What does it mean to feel Asian anyway?

My mother is a proud Filipina, but my Australian dad is of British and German ancestry, with convict ancestors who came out to Australia in the second fleet. As a little girl, my parents once told me: “You’re Eurasian, because you’re mixed raced ”

As I got older, I became confused about what it feels like to be mixed-race Throughout my life, I felt the need to choose one or the other – am I Australian, or am I Asian? The answer to this question is relative When I’m with white Aussies, I’m Asian; when I’m with Asian people, I’m Aussie. I don’t really belong anywhere.

Throughout my teenage years, my dad told me that I was focusing too much on being Asian. He once said that if I didn’t bring attention to my Filipina heritage then no one would be able to tell that I’m Asian in the first place. This confused 14year-old me even more How am I supposed to not focus on it when it’s one of the first things that people notice about me?

They ask me what my background is, and I love this question, because it opens up an avenue of conversation, which helps me connect with others I always ask them the same question back, and nine times out of ten, it becomes an interesting conversation about family history and genealogy Being part Filipina is great!

I can approach other Filipinos with ease because we already have a connection through our shared culture.

However, being only half-Filipina has at times made me feel that I am disconnected from my mother’s culture. Not being able to speak my mother’s native languages has been an ongoing issue for me, and the main thing that makes me feel as if I’m not “Filipino enough.”

Even with other Filip-Aussies (mixed-race Aussie kids with one Filipino parent), there are superficial degrees as to how Filipino I am compared to them Basically, where do I fit within the arbitrary hierarchy of mixed-race Filipinos? To some, I’m “white-washed,” but to others, they see me as “more Filipino” than themselves

It's taken me 18-years to figure this out, and I’m still navigating my way through understanding my identity, but I am now starting to realise that I will never truly belong to any culture, because I have my own. There are no rules to culture, and no standards that I need to meet

I have every right to claim both sides of my heritage because they are mine to claim I am Eurasian and I’m Australian and I’m Filipino and I’m proud to be mixed-race. I am all of these things at once, but I am also the result of thousands of years of love and perseverance, and that is something to be proud of