Just a silly little story of a very personal experience...
Growing as a Dominican-American in an area with a relatively large number of Dominicans (Florida) isn't easy when people constantly assume you're everything but Dominican. Both of my parents are white Dominicans. By the stereotypes and common beliefs about us, no one in my immediate family looks Dominican. They don't "act" Dominican either. My mother doesn't own a single merengue album, doesn't like it, and has never even danced to it. We never displayed a Dominican flag in our car, as most tend to do. No one ever taught me how to play dominoes. My mother would cook non-Dominican food just as often as she cooked mangu or made sancocho. In fact, the only "evidence" that we might be Dominican while I was growing up was the fact that my brother and I played baseball. Don't take this to mean that my mother somehow wanted to deny our heritage either. From an early age, I learned and memorized in detail how the Dominican founding fathers lead the overthrow of the Haitians. I've even read two books about "El Generalissimo" and can debate with you all day concerning el caudillo Balaguer and if his governmant helped or hindered the progress of the country. My grandmother even took it upon herself to make sure I knew the Dominican national anthem, word for word.
Needless to say, even other Dominicans were often surprised to learn that I too was Dominican. In Florida if you're white and speak Spanish, everyone just assumes you're Cuban or Puerto-Rican. Because of my quiet, sober personality, I would often be called "pariguayo" by "real" (or so they thought) Dominicans. It would always bother me that other Dominicans never really saw me as one of their own. The fact that I lived in the Dominican Republic for five years and could read and write Spanish just as well as English did not qualify me as a "real" Dominican. Anyway...I began to dislike "real" Dominicans more and more. Until one summer when, at sixteen years of age, I had the chance to visit the country alone. I hadn't been to the country since moving to the U.S. at the age of seven.
That's when I learned what a "real" Dominican was. Dominicans, just like the people of every other country in this world, are normal people with many of the same concerns and goals that we have here in the U.S. They're not the loud-mouthed, obnoxious, baggy clothes wearing (in my generation), gringo-haters whose identity is totally wrapped up in the fact that they're Dominican. REAL Dominicans don't exaggerate their accents or somehow manage to inject "ta heavy" or "ah, po ta bien" into every sentence they speak. Real Dominicans simply know that they're Dominican. They find no need to create stereotypes in another country that give a very negative, untrue image about our people.
After talking to many REAL Dominicans, I found that they despised the type of Dominicans that had so often given me a hard time back in the U.S. Those "Dominicans" who would display their heritage as if it was a personal accomplishment are seen by REAL Dominicans as wannabes and posers. Real dominicans can easily identify someone who grew up in the U.S., no matter how hard they try to force their pathetic imitation of the Dominican accent.
Well, let me wrap this up by saying that, if you think being Dominican means drinking Presidente, thinking your God's gift to women, and having no mental filter for the garbage that makes it's way to your big mouth, then I seriously suggest taking a trip to the Dominican Republic.
Ooops!....Just realized that I posted this in the wrong forum. Anyone know how to move a post?
Growing as a Dominican-American in an area with a relatively large number of Dominicans (Florida) isn't easy when people constantly assume you're everything but Dominican. Both of my parents are white Dominicans. By the stereotypes and common beliefs about us, no one in my immediate family looks Dominican. They don't "act" Dominican either. My mother doesn't own a single merengue album, doesn't like it, and has never even danced to it. We never displayed a Dominican flag in our car, as most tend to do. No one ever taught me how to play dominoes. My mother would cook non-Dominican food just as often as she cooked mangu or made sancocho. In fact, the only "evidence" that we might be Dominican while I was growing up was the fact that my brother and I played baseball. Don't take this to mean that my mother somehow wanted to deny our heritage either. From an early age, I learned and memorized in detail how the Dominican founding fathers lead the overthrow of the Haitians. I've even read two books about "El Generalissimo" and can debate with you all day concerning el caudillo Balaguer and if his governmant helped or hindered the progress of the country. My grandmother even took it upon herself to make sure I knew the Dominican national anthem, word for word.
Needless to say, even other Dominicans were often surprised to learn that I too was Dominican. In Florida if you're white and speak Spanish, everyone just assumes you're Cuban or Puerto-Rican. Because of my quiet, sober personality, I would often be called "pariguayo" by "real" (or so they thought) Dominicans. It would always bother me that other Dominicans never really saw me as one of their own. The fact that I lived in the Dominican Republic for five years and could read and write Spanish just as well as English did not qualify me as a "real" Dominican. Anyway...I began to dislike "real" Dominicans more and more. Until one summer when, at sixteen years of age, I had the chance to visit the country alone. I hadn't been to the country since moving to the U.S. at the age of seven.
That's when I learned what a "real" Dominican was. Dominicans, just like the people of every other country in this world, are normal people with many of the same concerns and goals that we have here in the U.S. They're not the loud-mouthed, obnoxious, baggy clothes wearing (in my generation), gringo-haters whose identity is totally wrapped up in the fact that they're Dominican. REAL Dominicans don't exaggerate their accents or somehow manage to inject "ta heavy" or "ah, po ta bien" into every sentence they speak. Real Dominicans simply know that they're Dominican. They find no need to create stereotypes in another country that give a very negative, untrue image about our people.
After talking to many REAL Dominicans, I found that they despised the type of Dominicans that had so often given me a hard time back in the U.S. Those "Dominicans" who would display their heritage as if it was a personal accomplishment are seen by REAL Dominicans as wannabes and posers. Real dominicans can easily identify someone who grew up in the U.S., no matter how hard they try to force their pathetic imitation of the Dominican accent.
Well, let me wrap this up by saying that, if you think being Dominican means drinking Presidente, thinking your God's gift to women, and having no mental filter for the garbage that makes it's way to your big mouth, then I seriously suggest taking a trip to the Dominican Republic.
Ooops!....Just realized that I posted this in the wrong forum. Anyone know how to move a post?
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