Basic White Girl or Nah?

As I read Amy Tans, "Fish Cheeks", all that was running through my mind was how this describes my relatives. My mom is Chinese and Hawaiian. She is very loud and "licks the end of her chopsticks"(paragraph 5) at dinner. I have, so desperately, wanted to not be related to these people before because they were different from my friends parents. I grew up in Boise, Idaho, which is not diverse other than for the five Asians in my high school. My best friends are all white and my boyfriend is white. I have never felt so different, just as Amy Tan did in her narrative about her Christmas Eve dinner with the minister and his son. Growing up different is one of the hardest concepts to live with because you can't change who you are on the inside. Amy Tan's mother said, "You want to be the same as American girls on the outside. But inside you must always be Chinese. You must be proud to be different. Your only shame is to have shame."(paragraph 7) My entire life I have Americanized my looks, some would call me a basic white girl, with a love for Starbucks, UGGS, and white high top converse. My physical appearance might scream white girl but I know that I can never change who I am or who my mom and relatives are. You can't just change your ethnicity and you can't tell your relatives to change either. Be proud to be different.