I'm a mix of Asian and white. I look mostly Asian, but Asian people can tell I'm not fully Asian while white people usually assume I'm completely Asian. The first time I went over to my girlfriend's grandfather's house he met me at the door and said, “Sorry. Wrong house we didn't order Chinese food”, since I was holding a big bag of food for everyone for dinner. After my girlfriend saw this she doubled over laughing at the terribly racist remark and assumption her grandfather had just made. This was a point where I could have either laughed along with the craziness of the mixup or gotten very mad at the racist assumption that I was a Chinese delivery person simply because I was an unfamiliar Asian person with food.
Long story short, I laughed, we all laughed, and ever since then I have become incredibly close with my girlfriend's white grandfather. Me being Asian has no real difference on the fact that we get along great and like the same things. It's crazy that the first time we met could have been a disaster, but looking back that painfully awkward meeting helped us break the ice.
Another time, my girlfriend and I went out to eat at a restaurant with her family in a smaller, more rural town. The waitress assumed I was an adopted brother and not the boyfriend of my girlfriend. It was quite awkward and we all had a big laugh about it after she made a point to say how cool it was that our family had adopted me from overseas.
The bottom line is most situations with interracial couples can either be made to be incredibly disturbing acts of racism and ignorance, but they can also be laughed at for being as ridiculous as they are and as shockingly random as they can be. You need to be open minded to other people's gut opinions and the things that come out of their mouths in an interracial relationship. If you take everything too personally and think everyone is insulting or being rude you'll never be able to make an interracial relationship last.
Contributed by Mark
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