Part 5 - Nisha moodley shares a bit about being multi racial

So, I actually read somewhere on your website that you're multiracial. Yeah. How did that interplay in your life? What are you? What's your ethnic make-up? Yeah you just asked the magic question. So when I was a kid, I grew up in a pretty, fairly diverse community, even though I grew up in Western Canada, which people might not think as the most diverse place ever. I grew up in a small city, it wasn't a town, it was a small city. And, you know, we had kids of a lot of different ethnic backgrounds in our class. So, the question that I got asked all the time was: "What are you?" And I think, you know, at that time it was like, all the Korean, Japanese and Chinese kids just got called Chinese, or Asian. Or oriental. And then, you know, like any kid, any European kid, Eastern European kid, kid of Eastern European descendance was the white kid, or normal kid. And you know, we had a few black kids, and the brown kids were in the end. And I was, you know, my Father's South Indian, although my family has been in South Africa for many generations. And my Mother is Scottish/English/Welsh. So if you can imagine a picture of my Mom and Dad, my Dad is very, very dark-skinned, sort of black hair, really dark eyes, very dark features, South Indian. My Mother is very fair, light blue eyes, freckles, and sort of had, you know, reddish-brown hair, like auburn, light-auburn hair I would say when I was growing up. So you didn't look like either of them? Not entirely. I mean, I haven't had the experience in my life of looking at somebody and saying "My Gosh, we really look alike." And you know there will be moments when I'll see a picture of me and my Dad and I can see the features that we share, or a picture of my Mom and I and can see the features that we share, but certainly not the "Wow, I really look like my Brother/Sister/Mother/Father/." So growing up, kids would always ask "What are you?" And I didn't know how to answer the question because it's kind of a big answer and I was little, didn't know really the answer, understand the answer. So, I feel like part of the role that it played in my life is I was very curious about other cultures, about other foods, I always wondered where people's parents were from, so the answer like white, black or Asian was not, didn't mean anything to me. I wanted to know like what country are you from, is your family from, and how long have they been here? So all of that was really interesting to me and those are the parts, the sort of good parts, although that's good and bad judgement, so it's another conversation. Those are the parts of being, you know, mixed race that I really value and appreciate having. And the parts that have been harder to work with are just feeling really different and lonely in that difference, and really wanting to relate to and identify with the other kids, you know, who were Indian, or Hindu, you know, kind of like there's something we share, but not feeling entirely like I was part of the club. And so always sort of feeling halfway in and out.