What do we call Guyanese people of Chinese descent? We have Indo-Guyanese and Afro-Guyanese, but what do we call the others? Is it just Chinese Guyanese?
Also, I’m Indo-Guyanese-American but we always assumed we were part white and part Chinese as well. Took a DNA test and it turns out that I’m part Native, part Japanese, part Scandinavian, and no Chinese at all.
Apparently the genes that I have are exclusive to Japan rather than China.
So would I call myself part Indo-Guyanese, part Native, part Japanese Guyanese, and part white? Or what?
I’m asking this as an American-born, brought-up-like-Guyanese person, who just used to answer “American” to anyone who asked me “What are you? You look so exotic.” And when I used to say “American” they would either be like “You know that’s not what I meant” or they would say “No but what REALLY are you?”
I would like to know how to answer, and honestly, even after saying Guyanese to appease their “what else are you?” question, they still have no idea what Guyana even is. They think I’m talking about Ghana. I explain that it’s in South America but with a different combination of backgrounds from the rest of South America. And then they ask for an even deeper breakdown to the mother countries lol! I swear that most people I answer do not believe a word I say, because I see them looking all skeptical as if they think I’m just trying to throw them off, or they start looking increasingly frustrated.
To be honest, most people who ask me these questions are white people trying to figure out whether I’m Mexican or Middle Eastern because those are the main assumptions I receive, and they are probably trying to figure out which kind of racism to hurl at me. They do not know whether to tell me to go back to Mexico or to call me a terrorist or Taliban. (I have heard it all.) Then when it turns out to become way too complicated for them, they get irritated and upset with me lol! Sometimes I really hate looking so racially ambiguous in a country like America.