Micki Rupon '07

Con orgullo

     I don’t consider myself to be in a bicultural relationship. It’s funny, though, because I can recall specific points in my life when I would see a white woman walking with a Hispanic man and a fleeting thought regarding the couple’s ethnically diverse relationship would pop into my head. But now I’m the one in just such a relationship; I am white and Jonathan is Hispanic – not just Hispanic-American though, he is straight-off-the-boat-from-South-America Hispanic.

      Since the day we first met, I have been aware of the fact that Jonathan was born and raised in a very different culture from mine, but we are so similar in so many ways that unless we are standing in front of a mirror intentionally examining my light olive complexion compared to his dark skin and hard features characteristic of his Incan ancestors, I forget all about the fact that he is Latino and I am white.

     It wasn’t until about a year into our relationship that I suddenly became aware of just how different our two cultures are; or rather, how different his culture and my non-culture are…

     It is the middle of August and Jonathan and I are on our way to yet another one of his family’s big parties. These “family” parties include immediate family, extended family, friends of the family, friends of friends of the family, neighbors, coworkers, and the occasional random extranjero who nobody seems to know but who everyone welcomes con un beso en la mejilla or a shot of Cristal Aguardiente. These parties tend to occur just about every other weekend and usually have nothing to do with a special occasion but are, instead, just an excuse to have a good time, drink, and dance.

     As soon as I walk down into the basement of la casa de Helmo y Martha, I'm greeted by the blaring beats of Salsa music and about thirty-five of J.R.’s closest family and friends. He and I each grab a Corona and sit down on the white folding chairs outlining the perimeter of the room for a couple minutes before joining the rest of the couples out on the dance floor. This party is like any other except for the fact that I am suddenly struck by the realization that I am unlike every single person here.

     I look to my right at “La Tía,” the old woman who came to the U.S. illegally from Colombia years ago, got deported, and then made the dangerous trek back across the border into the U.S. for the second time. And she’s not the only one. Almost everyone at the party has some harrowing story related to how they arrived here in America from either Colombia or Ecuador (Jonathan, by some mistake of the airline he was traveling on, arrived in the states from Ecuador flying first-class). I can count at least four people who traveled north through South and Central America on foot and then paid with what little money they had to be squished onboard a tiny boat and make the dangerous journey to America by way of the ocean with nothing more to eat than saltines and a few cans of soda.

     Everyone at the party is proud of their heritage and their roots. They refer to their culture in a very personal manner. Jonathan's uncle approaches me at one point and says: “Somos gente muy sensual. Amamos bailar, somos ruidosos, nuestras mujeres son las mejores cocineras (y las más atractivas del mundo), y el fútbol es nuestra pasión.”

     I realize that the “we” he refers to isn’t just the people at the party, he means his entire culture as a whole.

     When Uncle Gino leaves, I turn and watch everyone dancing to the music de su gente. They dance with such intense passion and I catch myself staring at the couples, in awe of their movements and the emotions they feel. The next song is one about la patria and some of them start to cry remembering the husbands, wives, or children they left behind in South America.

     And then I look down at my hands – the hands of my Greek and Italian mother – and I realize that neither those two cultures, nor the Serbian in me from my father’s side, has ever made as strong an impact on my life as the culture of everyone around me at this party.

     When friends ask me what my nationality is, I always tell them that I’m one quarter Greek, one quarter Italian, and half Serbian when, in truth, it was my great-grandparents who came to this country years ago and the only link I have to those cultural pasts are the last names of various family members: Rigopoulos, Rizzo, and Warchak. At weddings and other family gatherings, we dance the traditional dances of our ancestors but we don’t dance with the pride that Jonathan and his family dance with.

      I don’t refer to Greeks, Italians, and especially not Serbians (I didn’t even know where the country was located until ninth grade) as “my people.” No one in my family ever gets emotional when a sad song comes on the radio in a foreign language, large family gatherings just don’t happen on the spur of the moment, and I don’t have a clue as to how my ancestors wound up on American soil to begin with.

      I take another look at my surroundings and I am faced with the realization that not only am I the only non-Latino at this party, but for the first time I truly recognize that I am different from Jonathan. His life revolves around his culture and he maintains a great deal of orgullo de su pasado y su herencia. He is Ecuatoriano y Colombiano and although he is now an American citizen, he will always be, first and foremost, Latino.