Dominican | Mexican

Photo credit: Provided by subject

I’m Dominican, Mexican, American, Black. I am a bunch of things and I don’t just consider fitting myself into one race. I’m Christian and I’m straight. My Mom is Dominican, and my Dad is Mexican. They met in New York at a very young age in a pizzeria. 

When it comes to language they both have different accents, the music as well is different but we all play a mixture of the two. Being that my family is religious we mainly listened to the same Christian gospel music. I have been to both Mexico and DR. 

I choose my partner solely on chemistry and love and morals my partner has. My culture is within me which may have affected the morals I have/ expect my partner to have, but all in all it did not have that great of an impact for me to choose my partner. 

I am very proud of my background and who I am, I feel like I always need to be true to myself, both sides of my family have endured a lot of poverty and pain, so I am proud to be where I am today because of the generations in my family that worked to get me where I am. Forever grateful. I think it’s very beautiful to see an interracial relationship. The babies always come out beautiful and it’s amazing to see two different people completely different put aside differences and join as one. My Grandparents have seen it probably as strange or unusual being that they come from a place where everyone looks like them.

I live in a predominantly White neighbourhood, many have been loving and caring while others have not. I have and so has my family received racial remarks. People telling me to straighten my hair, act different, my mom to learn English and my Dad to go back to his country. Multiple times my family received racism, it’s a shame because many times people say things and they don’t realize that it can be perceived as racist and rude.

I went to the Dominican Republic as a kid, I’d go there a lot. Mexico I’ve visited twice and plan on going again. I love seeing my family because it is truly a humbling experience to witness them. As a child my outlook has definitely changed, I was more innocent so for me race wasn’t really a huge thing I didn’t think it held that much of a significance I just knew who I was as a person and the morals and culture my family has, growing up now to an adult I feel more aware of the racism and the way my culture and my background may affect how I’m treated or viewed.

I am a model. I used to work as a cashier at target and I’ve held other jobs as well, but as of Right now I’m a free-lance model. I feel that generally speaking they actually do want exotic looking girls to be models especially young ones like myself, so they are accepting except they all want that very thin and tall model which I am not. I am thin but I’m not extremely tall and with video shoots they want those slim and thick models, so at the same time it’s very different depending on what field I’m doing. 

If I had the opportunity to be reborn I would like to return as another human to get a second chance at life, or being a horse. I love horses. There's something about them I find very beautiful, maybe it’s the way they look, or their hair, or the way when they run they go fast, and I just grew up always in love with them. I would like the world to become more united, girls helping girls, boys helping boys, all ages and sizes to be welcomed, we are human we all make mistakes, I’m not perfect but I will choose to live my life trying to be a happy person every day and make other people happy. I feel that racism will never go away, but we can help teach the next generation to not see color. We are all human beings, my skin color and hair, or the way I speak, or my culture should not in any way be a reason for me to be treated less than. We are all equals and in God's eyes we are all perfect.

I’m managing well through this global pandemic. I go out mainly for jobs that I do, photo shoots and video shoots, along other things I’m always outside so I do try my best to be as cautious as possible.