Growing up Hispy

I’d probably fit in at any coffee shop or cocktail bar in any big city in America. I’m apt to wear oxfords and polo shirts, I’ve owned a few pairs of loafers and if Dockers has made a pair of khaki pants, I’ve probably owned them. My drink of choice is a stiff vodka martini or perhaps a good scotch. I frequently read magazines like Esquire and GQ to get hip with what the cool kids do. My CD case is riddled with Sinatra, opera or jazz compilations and Dave Matthews (and perhaps one or two violent rap CD’s). Yup! In all, I’d say I’m a fairly standard American pseudo-intellectual. Oh, and I’m Hispanic. No, no… don’t worry; keep your wallet. All that means is that I’m perennially tanned.

Or does it?

My parents came from the tiny, little (troublesome) country of Nicaragua. You may have heard of it… that whole Iran-Contra thing? The one that wasn’t “Iran”… yeah, that was Nicaragua. They coined the term Sandinistas, were considered for the Panama Canal (it would have been embarrassing to have the Panama Canal go through Nicaragua anyway) and invented bananas. In 1912, there was some dispute between Juan Banan and Miguel Annana over who ACTUALLY invented bananas which ultimately resulted in the Banana Wars. It’s plural because in 1915, and again in 1927, Juan conceded to Miguel but went on to tell all his friends that Miguel was a punk and he didn’t care what peace accords were signed, he, Juan, was actually the mastermind behind bananas. The wars raged until 1933, when the US Marines finally settled the dispute; THEY had actually invented bananas in 1904, only they were called “jihadist-fingers”.

My father arrived in Los Angeles in the mid-seventies. He was a 16 year old stranger in a strange land determined to use his new found independence to wear white t-shirts, grow facial hair, smoke out and jive with his merry band of miscreants at the local discotheque (none of which had been exported to Nicaragua quite yet… his hobbies that is, not so much the other miscreants). My mother was sent over in the late-seventies to live with, who she describes as the Nicaraguan lieutenants of Satan himself (theologians have determined conclusively that Satan is actually Canadian). She was kept under lock and key to assure that she would get a proper education and wouldn’t hang around the likes of thin-mustached bums… so my parents married in 1982 and a mysterious eight months later, there I was—another Latino.

I was born under the glow of the Hollywood sign in a hospital on Sunset Blvd across the street from the Church of Scientology and the L. Ron Hubbard Center for Dianetics. Let the adventure begin. For the first five years of my life, we lived in a neighborhood near USC with the rest of my eccentric (read “crazy”) family. While my dad had taught himself fluent English and my mom spoke with an adorably strong accent, the decision was made to speak to me exclusively in Spanish until I got to grade school. I, however, would show them; my first word was “Pepsi”.

My father started making a decent salary and we moved from Los Angeles to a suburb thereof. I got around to learning English from my time around white kids at a day-care/pre-school called Children’s World. Once I learned English, there was no going back to talking “Nicaraguan”; I’d finally been exposed to what I thought was “American Culture” by being around white kids who I thought were definitively American. In my early grade school years, I was surrounded almost exclusively by white kids and I didn’t understand why I had to be any different. Ahhhh, the formative years of cultural identity crises. My parents recount stories of six and seven year old me’s throwing tantrums when reminded that I was, in fact, Latino. As evidence, they’d point to the undeniable fact that my skin was browner than my buddies. Upon further inspection, they were right. I cried.

We moved to another suburb, even further from Los Angeles after my sister was born and my parents decided that a growing family needed a bigger house. This was a dramatic demographic shift; there were still the white kids with which I could “identify”, but now there were lots of Hispanic kids with which I was “identified”. There were two or three white families on my street, the rest were either directly from Mexico or Mexican, but so very well assimilated that you could scarcely tell. I got along well with the kids, but being the nerdy, chubby kid that actually liked books made me different.

When I was seven, my parents took me to Nicaragua to see La Madre-landia. As I recall, there was poverty everywhere, everything was dirty and dogs and chickens ran around like street-gangs (think The Outsiders). There was only one place in Managua that made hamburgers (what I then considered THE perfect food) and they tasted of office supplies. My Nicaraguan cousins didn’t like me because I had an air of superiority about me. Simply put, I was American and they were, well, different.

SIDEBAR:
I’m sure other cultures do this, but Hispanic genealogy mandates that anyone in your family that cannot be immediately identified as your father, mother, brother, sister, grandfather or grandmother is, by default, your cousin. Older cousins or the cousins of your parents are called aunts or uncles. Your parents closest friends from La Madre-landia and people who are in any of your baby pictures are also your aunts and uncles and their kids are your cousins.

At seven years old, I regarded Nicaragua as the country where pride dejectedly went to die. Fortunately, shame welcomed it with open arms. To be realistic—as a seven year old—I very likely said something like “Nicaragua IS a poo-head”. My Spanish fluency continued to deteriorate and I was eager to see the day when I didn’t understand it anymore. Speaking Spanish in front of my friends was painfully embarrassing and God forbid anyone see me coming out of the Catholic Church where all the Mexicans prayed to their Jesus (hey-seuss).

Back in California, I excelled at school and was transferred to a magnet program at another school. Yup, where all the cool kids were; the kids who read three grade levels ahead and saw the Science Fair as an opportunity to shine. By the sixth grade, I hated speaking Spanish because that affirmed that I was “one of them”. Conversations in my household were (and probably still are) like listening to badly translated Language-on-Cassette lessons. I would address my mom in English; she’d respond in Spanish. My dad would chime in with something addressed to both of us in Spanish and scold me in English when I rolled my eyes. I would be exceedingly mean to my little sister in English and send her crying to rat me out in Spanish.

SIDEBAR: Fun with Direct Translations
Ever hear a foreigner use English phrases that didn’t quite hit the desired note? Here’s what happens when equivalent clichés get literally translated. Absurdity!

Easy come, easy go = Those monies of his sexton, singing yourselves came and singing yourselves they go.
You’ve made your bed now lie in it = Who evil bed cause to look, in she himself it lies
Forewarned is forearmed = Man cautioned voucher because of two
What’s done is done = To him accomplished, breast
There’s no honor among thieves = Thought him robber what everyone was from your condition
Birds of a feather flock together = Every who with your every what

My parents had very distinct philosophies for punishment. My dad ordered me to pick the belt from his drawer that he would swat me (what seemed) enthusiastically across my young bum. This is the equivalent of Indiana Jones’ predicament at the end of The Last Crusade; picking the right goblet was crucial. The big one would hurt, but wouldn’t last long. The small one would get me a quick, angry whipping for my insolence… and then I’d be sent for the big one. The shame of walking to and from his drawer with the second belt in my hand hurt more than the spankings ever did. My mom, on the other hand would neither offer me options nor give me the courtesy of a second to brace myself. I’d break, say, climb, steal or lie about something and she’d reach behind her back without looking, grab whatever her hand landed on and hit me with it. We’d be on the beach and she’d still manage to find a spatula that, presumably, some other Hispanic mother had strategically placed for just such an instance. I realized this was common amongst Hispanic mothers when I saw my neighbors get in trouble and instantly have a sandal, discarded baseball mitts or Lhasa Apsos flung at them. Hispanic Mothers: Masters of Weapons of Opportunity.

Speaking of punishments Latino parents impose on their children to keep them in line, growing up Hispanic invariably meant growing up Roman Catholic. I’ve developed a theory that Hispanics are Roman Catholics because we need excuses to celebrate things and grill meat. It’s not enough to say “Hey, Jose, let’s have some barbeque today for lunch. We’ll each call our respective 90 cousins and ask them to bring their own tortillas.” Oh, no! It HAS to be someone’s birthday, patron saint’s day, anniversary, marriage, baptism, communion or confirmation. When we ran out of religious pretexts, we’d move on to celebrating individual battles “we” may have won against some colonial power well over a century ago. Barring those… ummm… awww, hell. “Órale, vamos a asar carne para Martin Luther King Jr.!”

Every good Hispanic Roman Catholic has overstocked their homes with obscenely graphic ceramic representations of Jesus hanging limply on the cross. Houses with discriminating tastes would hang paintings of Christ doing something, you know, godly. We also had lots of candles with pictures of Jesus, Mary and the saints doing… ummm… awesome things. The idea was that were the apocalypse to roll around within the next few years and God required proof of faith, Hispanics would be able to point to all kinds of Lord Paraphernalia. “Yes, sir, God! We have every candle in the collection. I bet if you go to the Ehs-smithes (how Smith is pronounced with an accent) you’ll see they were too concerned with being tasteful to care about getting into heaven.”

This seems to be my mother’s principal concern regarding who I marry. While I have no set preference, the trend has shown that the girls I’ve brought home to meet my folks are generally white. This seems to suggest for my mom that there is a greater possibility that they’re not Roman Catholic and thereby assuring that Mrs. Paco Ramirez will invariably stop her from celebrating baptisms, first communions and birthdays by grilling meat.
“Mom, white people like grilling meat too.”
“Oh, sure they do, mijo (mee-ho, a phrase meaning “my son”), but you can’t trust white people to bring their own tortillas.”

She’s probably on to something. The sad reality is, simply, since I left Fontana, I haven’t met many Hispanic girls. I’m certainly a fan; racial genetics have left Hispanic girls with the lion’s share of “hottie” genes. I’ve found though (and this may be a direct result of living in DC for the past four years) that during college age, girls are most polarized along The Latina Spectrum. On one end of the spectrum are what I call The Unwed Mothers and on the other are The Family Trophies. The Unwed Mother is a girl whose ambition is inversely proportional to her fertility. The less they expect out of life, the more they seem to have babies. UM’s will finish high school, but rarely get past community college because that’s valuable time that could be spent finding a husband that makes $12 an hour. The Family Trophies come from decent, hard-working families that heavily emphasized the importance of “doing well in school and becoming independent because, mija, we work so very hard for you and your sisters and we want what’s best for you and you can’t rely on one of these good-for-nothings to support you. No, mija, you have to go to college and focus of school. Ensure that whatever you do, you do not have the slightest bit of sex with these cheesy, wannabe writer types. Especially not if he’s Nicaraguan. They’re going nowhere… and they carry knives.”

Doubtless, there are plenty of girls floating in the middle, I just haven’t met many. So, by circumstance, it seems, I’ve dated principally white girls. Which works out fine because meeting their parents gives me an opportunity to dress well and say charming things… inevitably, the parents who are uncomfortable will try to compliment me by calling me “exotic” or “cultured”. I thank them politely and cheerfully tell them that after dinner, I planned on robbing their daughters at knife point, because—as well you know—Nicaraguans carry knives.

Being Nicaraguan specifically is special all its own. Nicaragua isn’t Mexico nor is it in South America. There are big Nicaraguan communities in Los Angeles and Miami (when I say “big” I mean someone’s opened a restaurant for “our” people… that’s when you know you’ve made it. Next we’ll have our own Little Tokyo or Chinatown and call it “Nicaragua” because the “little” is implied), but very few Americans know anything about it. Growing up in Southern California, (where chances are good that if someone is Hispanic, they’re probably also Mexican) we blended in pretty well with the Mexican culture. We were immersed in it and there was no point in fighting it. As a result, my accent and idiosyncrasies in Spanish are completely indistinguishable. I switch back and forth between Mexican and Nicaraguan colloquialisms with a ridiculous speaking rhythm influenced by years of trying to forget and peppered with red-blooded, American pomposity.

So, I’ve accepted being Mexican in Southern California. No point in fighting, I suppose. When people interchange Hispanic and Mexican, there’s really nothing for me to get offended about. I can’t exactly pull out a globe and an easel with some dry-erase markers for their cultural edification in every instance (pending a grant from the US Endowment for Nicaraguan Geographical Identification). I used to point it out, but I quit when I would frequently be asked what part of Mexico Nicaragua was in. “Southern,” I’d say, “Very Southern. In fact, you’re almost well out of Mexico by the time you get to Nicaragua…. Yeah… Hey, so what part of the moon is your family from?” Now, I know that when I’m in California, Arizona, Nevada or Texas, I’m Mexican. In New York, I’m Puerto Rican. In Florida, I’m Cuban. And anywhere in the South, I’m colored just like the rest of them.

At 21, I’ve come a long way from thinking Nicaragua is a poo-head. I’m fascinated by its turbulent history and its resilient populous. I have no patronage towards Nicaragua though, nor do I feel I have to. I know I’m Hispanic and perfectly happy with that, but I don’t know how to BE Hispanic. That only really comes into question when I’m told that I’m the whitest Mexican anybody knows. I’m not offended… but what does that mean, exactly?

I look Hispanic, don’t I? My last name ends in “ez”, I speak Spanish and we grill meat (and yes, eat beans). Check, check and check. What am I missing? Do literacy and articulation go as check marks in the white or brown side? How about education and ambition? No, I don’t have hydraulics on my car or tattoos of the Virgin Mary. Am I disqualified? I do very much like mariachis, Latin-American cuisine, Negra Modelo beer and Ricky Martin. Ummm… ooops, I guess I don’t use the word “Latino” enough even though it sounds more, you know, descriptive. I don’t attend rallies and I’ve never once felt discriminated (but you better believe I check the Hispanic/Latino box in applications for those extra points). I’m even registered as a Republican…

GASP! No, mijo, you can’t be Republican! What would Cesar Chavez say? What would Jennifer Lopez say? What would the Rev. Al Sharpton say? Mijo, think of what you’re doing to Al Sharpton.

Well, so I’m too brown for the whities and too white for the brownies. The question is: should it matter? Do I really need that cultural identification to be self-actualized? If I answer no, does that make me white? Regardless as to whether or not I’m comfortable with it, that cultural identity is still a void. I know it’s there, it’s never stopped me from doing anything nor encouraged me to do anything… but I feel it. Is it better not to?

A few months ago, while talking to a friend of mine who’s in the same culturally disaffected boat I am (only while mine’s named the USS Nicaragua, hers is the USS China), she explained to me that although I may not be white and I may not exactly be Latino, I was the best at being Hispy of anyone she knew. So, here’s to being the best Hispy Christina knows.

That’s all.