As a senior in college, I’m so excited to graduate. I’m excited to never have to deal with professors, homework, grades, tests, essays, books that are mandated rather than for recreation, and all the other stuff that goes on with school. I can’t wait to have an ordinary boring life. To go to work, leave everything at the door at the end of the day, and just unwind. Yes, work is stressful, but there’s a group that’s with you and helping you a long. It’s not like in school where you’re depending on your professors, but they don’t care that much about you. And you may compete with co-workers, but not with all of them, like when you compete with your classmates. There are jobs you can’t leave at the door, ones that will follow you home, and maybe I’m romanticizing an “ordinary” life, but I’m still done with school. I’m ready for the real world. I’m ready to have a job, make my own way, and even pay my student loans. I’m ready to start my life. 

In school we learned about something called fragmented self - how an individual is not whole, but instead different shards of one mirrored face that reflects and refracts society’s expectations. One fragment shows the way you were socialized, another your biologically determined traits and the last one illustrates how you yourself are subjugated in society, as well as how you place yourself in society. The conclusion is that you can never see yourself objectively because of the different lenses you place on yourself, and the gaze others place on you.

​First, let’s break it down. There’s a problem that’s been bothering me for a long time in the Asian American community, and all the subdivisions within that space. The problem is that the white majority see Asian Americans in one particular way. Most white people see Asian Americans as just extensions of the mainland country they might refer to for the sole purpose to identify and validate themselves, and to avoid “where are you from” questions. Adopted, first generation to third generation Asian Americans are not seen as American. This leads to many identity problems for the majority of the community. East Asians not born in the US, who come here to study abroad for instance, may look down upon Asian Americans for trying to “act Chinese (for example),” because to them, self identified Asian Americans are really only American. For the Asian Americans, they are excluded from white American society, so they try to fit into a culture that will accept them, which is usually wherever their parents identify. Usually, they are accepted, but other times, their parents may even alienate them for being “too American.”