It's almost eleven on my last Thursday in my Freshman dorm and I've just skimmed through my art professor, Kip Fulbeck's book Part Asian, 100% Hapa, and of course this means that I have to write a "mini" manifesto of my own "Hapa" identity, because it's the end of a year where everyone knows me.

At the beginning of every year, I get this question: What are you? Sure, there are a few people who don't ask, but they usually find out soon enough. I am so desperate to say that I am Filipino, to prove that I am Filipino, that I tell them straight away. When I am not fast enough, I get that question. A lot of people I meet immediately think I am Latina, mostly other Latinos and Latinas.

I hate hate hate when they speak to me in Spanish and when I tell them I don't speak it, they become irritated or puzzled. "No," I tell them. "No habla espanol." I had to learn that phrase to survive. They often do not believe me. What Latina doesn't speak some Spanish? "No, I am Filipino," I say. They do not believe me. I can't be Filipino. Finally I manage to convince them that I am Filipino. "My mother came from the Philippines when she was young to marry my dad."

But what is your father?

My father is white. I am Filipino and white. He's something specific like Scottish, something Western European, but he's not the parent that I am asked about. When they hear that he is white, they are happy. They have discovered what I am.

But I am not just the daughter of a multi-racial couple. I am more than the sum of my parts. I am neither. In a room full of Filipinos, I don't fit in. I never learned Tagalog because my white grandmother thought it wouldn't be good for me to learn two languages at the same time, especially in an English speaking country. In a neighborhood of whites, I can't disguise the natural tan of my skin.

I'm an outsider to both worlds, but I am a part of my own world. I'm not half and half, I'm one whole me. My hair isn't black, it's dark brown, and it is naturally curly. I have always wanted it to be straight so I could be more Asian and I used to tell my mom that I wanted to dye it black like hers. Now she dyes hers lighter to match mine.

I am just finishing my first year of college where I found out for the first time that other "Hapas" like me actually feel the same way I do when we get this question. Next year, I am sure that I will get it again, after I go away for a summer and have to return to campus and meet all new people in all new classes. I've had to deal with it my whole life with only my brother to understand.

So what am I?

I am a writer, amateur comic artist, singer, scholar, young woman and more than the sum of my parents.