Not the "As Seen on TV" Roma Experience
Reflections on being mixed and an unknown and unpopular minority.
Trigger warning: talk of discrimination and violence. (Edited for clarity)
Being Part Roma isn’t fun
I'm mixed. My mom is Roma (the polite term for gypsy), and my dad was not. Let me tell you, being Roma isn't all it's cracked up to be. In the U.S., there's no month dedicated to celebrating our culture, no scholarships to help us along, and good luck trying to find a TV show where someone like me is represented. Most Americans are clueless and regurgitate harmful myths. My family gaslighted themselves due to legitimate fears. Europe can be a minefield of discrimination, and Americans are harmfully ignorant.
I'm trying to downplay or compare us to the struggles of other groups when I bring up this subject. I want to talk about my own personal experience. I want to express how it's both frustrating and invalidating when people assume it's all fun and games for us. It is frustrating when they do not understand we are an ethnic group. They believe in myths like we attend wizard school or something. But the truth is, they're often clueless about the generational trauma, the scars of slavery, the pain of genocide, the epigenetic disorders, and the institutional racism we face. To them, it's like a magic fairy tale. They don’t know that we are people.
I don't get any benefits from being Roma. Fighting for Roma rights puts me at great risk. I'm jeopardizing my reputation, credibility, and safety if I speak out. If I hide, as most of my family members do, I'm hiding who I am, denying our history, and turning a blind eye to injustice. It feels like a no-win situation.
My Family Gas Lights Themselves
My family is so determined to distance themselves from the stereotypes that they refuse to embrace our heritage. We're not thieves, fortune tellers, or con artists. They want everyone to see us as just like everyone else, so they label us as white. Growing up, they wanted me to avoid dressing traditionally, like double braids with a center part, long skirts, or hoop earrings. Anything remotely associated with our culture is off-limits, hidden behind closed doors.
Whenever I asked about our heritage, they'd tell me we were "dark Germans." Apparently, we're the Germans with dark hair, olive undertones, big noses, pointy heads, giant cheekbones, and wide faces. We're the ones who make baskets, marionettes, and toys, and our "German" ancestors even lived in caravans.
All this secrecy was their way of keeping us safe. For years, there was a police training course that vilified us, and the FBI had a list of us. Just a few months ago, an LA gas station banned us. In Europe, Roma are being evicted and killed just for being Roma. This isn't ancient history; it's happening right now.
I don't think my great-grandparents told my grandparents much about our heritage. My grandpa's father simply told him and his siblings that they were American. They spoke English and farmed like good Americans. They wanted their family to be safe.
What Am I?
We don't exactly pass as typical Germans. When my mom was born, the hospital assumed she was a native. Growing up, no one looked like my mom, grandpa, or grandma. I didn't see my face anywhere. I just figured my face was deformed because it did not match other Europeans. Our traditions didn't align with white German culture. I've been called "exotic" my whole life and asked about my origins countless times.
Some love guessing my ancestry, like the time a taxi cab driver thought I was Irish and Israeli, even though the latter isn't even an ethnic group. Some people even assume I'm just "white" because I am pale (I am part European too). People often assume we are part South Italian, Greek, Turkish, or Native. Or people ask me if I am Jewish.
Growing up, I felt like I looked "evil." I thought I was ugly because of my nose and head shape. I thought my cheekbones were ugly. I thought my olive undertones made me look sick. I looked like a witch and not the good kind. These are the features gifted to me from my Romani heritage.
In elementary school, I sensed something was off during Heritage Week. The photos of Germany and its people in the school library didn't resemble anyone in my family. The food, clothing, and traditions were all foreign to me.
German?
The heartbreaking twist came when I learned that we are, in fact, German. Sinti are German Roma, and when you live in a place for centuries, it becomes a part of you. Roma lived in Germany during those centuries, and there was some mixing. Germany and the surrounding countries are our family's homeland.
I finally found people who looked like my mom examining the images of the Sinti murder in the Holocaust. I finally saw people who looked like Mommy. I saw people who looked like Grandpa.
Racism and genocide forced us away from our homeland. Those who stayed behind were gunned down by the Nazis, while survivors were pushed into poverty. Things would be different if it hadn’t happened. My identity would be different. I am not sure how.
My family, along with other Roma, came to the US before the genocide. They hid with white Germans, becoming "dark" Germans, not Sinti. I didn’t know this as a child, and I only discovered the word "Roma" from an article about Roma in the US. It all finally made sense, and I better understood my family and myself. Our traditions suddenly had a purpose, and I felt more complete.
Staplers
I didn’t learn about the Roma experience from a library; I truly began to understand it when I lived in Western Europe as a young adult. Despite people constantly asking "what I was" and calling me "exotic," I had always assumed I was just white. My pale skin led me to that conclusion. I never thought about my olive undertones, easy tanning, dark curly hair, or dark eyes; all these things made me ugly. It took me a while to realize that many Europeans could tell I was Roma just by looking at my face, and I often failed to recognize the racism directed at me as racism even as it negatively affected me.
I went for job interviews, and they hid their office supplies when they saw me. The ladies even hid their purses and valuables. Whenever I entered a nicer store myself, my bags were checked while no one else’s.
Once, I witnessed a lady wearing a traditional headscarf for a different ethnicity acting strangely at a grocery store. The cashier checked her bag and used me as an example to explain that the woman’s behavior, not her ethnicity, warranted the check. She had treated me fairly after all, she hadn’t checked my bags. She didn’t point out the other half a dozen people standing there.
I was shouted at and called racist names for Roma in German and French slurs by men who never talked to me multiple times. One older gentleman told me that the young woman who had robbed his house was like me, only from Romania.
After a job interview I had once, the receptionist contacted me and told me she had reported her employer for discrimination. This was because I was the ideal candidate but wasn’t hired for illegal reasons, and she refused to tolerate prejudice. I didn’t fully understand it at the time. How could they be racist against me? Wasn’t I white?
When my mom visited me, we found empty restaurants that told us they were full, only to seat other American tourists right after we walked away. Store clerks followed her; they didn’t do that to anyone else.
Then, a European friend clued me in that many people noticed I was part Roma. That my features looked Roma. It took me a while to process it after moving back.
The Path to Europe
I even did DNA tests on my family members, and the results were all over the place. Some showed larger bits of South Asian, Persian, Middle Eastern, and Turkish DNA, while others showed smaller amounts. They all showed DNA from every corner of Europe. My DNA shows a path from India to Europe. The path the Roma took.
However, my family continues to deny it. I don’t speak the language, and my family stopped living in caravans before I was born, even though my grandfather still recalls some of his family members living in Vardos. They do not fit the stereotypes. They are not superstitious.
It’s frustrating because I’ve experienced racism firsthand, yet I can’t openly discuss that experience. To some, I’m not "Roma enough." I am afraid of being accused of being a race faker. Americans who see color, not features, don’t understand. I am just an ugly white girl here again.
Don’t get me wrong; there are advantages to passing as white, and I’m part white. I’ve enjoyed white privilege, but I’ve also encountered racism because I’m Roma. In Europe, I lost employment opportunities, have been harassed on the street, and have felt threatened because of my ethnic heritage.
What box do I check?
Roma are not counted. I didn't know what to put when asked, “What is your race or ethnicity?” on a doctor's form or a job application. I am pale; does that mean I am white? Many of my ancestors came from Persia and India; does that mean I am Asian? It feels wrong to put any of these options down. They don’t represent my lived experience. Basic demographic information should not be a hard question to answer, yet it is.
It is also a problem for representation. We don’t know how many Roma live in this country. It makes us even more invisible. The United States is apparently unaware we even exist; we are not alone in this, and it isn’t okay.
To Talk or Not To Talk
It’s a complex, messy situation you won’t see on TV.
I don’t know how to process it. I don’t know how to respond when people say I look white or even when they ask me, “What are you?” I don’t know what to do when people assume I am Middle Eastern or Mediterranean. Or when people think Roma don’t look alike. I worry when I have a European coworker that I will face discrimination and not be able to defend myself. I worry people will think I fake it when I talk to them.
Do I talk about my experience, or do I stay safe? I have no answers. I have more questions. And I don’t think there are easy answers to my questions.
