All we had was a Swedish exchange student to make fun of, particularly because he wore a dress shirt and tie for the first month or so. Most of us had parents or grandparents from Sweden but he was the only person my age I knew who spoke Swedish. Interestingly, I am told that he has attended every class reunion.
Oh in my final year I just remembered we had a high achieving Chinese exchange student... she was from Hong Kong and couldn't speak any English. I have never known anything like it since, but by the time she left our school several months later she was fluent in Jockanese.....
@Holly Saunders Same here also, but it was not by chance......Cicero and berwyn, Illinois, small suburbs adjacent to City of Chicago, fought desegregation vehemently, even after equal-housing rights laws were passed. Frank
People here think it's weird that there weren't any Blacks in my high school graduation class. I guess because there's so many people here that lived in cities like Jacksonville, before moving to Jacksonville.
There weren't that many blacks in my HS either @Cody Fousnaugh and it was about 3500 students and from a few different communities. None in grade school at all.
I think that part of it is due to the climate, as far as why some of us grew up with mixed races, and others only saw white people when we were growing up. Except for on television, I had never even seen a black person until I was almost an adult, and that was in one of the larger towns, not the small town where I grew up. Darker skinned people all come from the hotter countries, and can take the heat really well; but not so much the cold and snow. We had one black person that lived up north in Idaho, and he said that even though he had lived there a long time, the cold weather was still really hard on him. On the other hand, there were some Korean families there, and they worked in the hops fields along with us, and those people could run circles around any of the rest of us, and the heat didn’t affect them at all. We would all be huffing and puffing and gulping down water at the ends of each row, while the Koreans trotted along and never stopped, and also did a wonderful job of training the hop plant as they trotted past each one. It was amazing to watch them go !
Most people here love race diversity and would never move to an area where there was none or very little.
As far as I am concerned, race doesn’t even enter into the picture, as far as where I would want to live; but it seems to be a real focus for you, @Cody Fousnaugh . My belief is that there are honest, caring and kind people of all nationalities, and some that are cruel and dishonest as well; so what I care about is what is on the inside of the person, and not at all what color the outside happens to be. It is the heart and soul that is much more important than the skin and hair.
One of my main friends is black most others are dark skinned, I am with them a lot, it took maybe 1 year for JR (black) and I to really mix well now with his family and all weekly for 4-5 years, even been on vacation with him, I was the only white we kid each other lots now his favorite is as hard as I try he says I will never get a tan like his. Just a friend is all in armed airline security 37 yrs now at DFW Airport, also ex Marine drill sgt, we fish weekly all year
I grew up among black people; worked with the them; played with the children; ate in their homes. I never heard the word "nigger" spoken in my home. They were our "Colored" neighbors and friends. I have only ever seen a few black people. The people I knew were all shades of brown but very few black. I wonder who designated that they be called black? I think colored is much more correct.
I am classed as an Anglo Saxon but I am English. No Black person or Asian person who lives in the UK refers to me as an English Anglo Saxon. Have never heard the term English Black English Asian. In this clip at 1.20 this girl destroys her self. Which is so unfair.
Race is in our view and it's fine with the people that live there. People just have to understand that there are blacks that prefer to live in an "all black" area, Hispanics that can want the same as well as Asians and other races. Not everyone wants to live in an area of multiple races. So, just because there are white folks that choose to live in an almost all white area, there shouldn't be a problem with that.
When the US was in its forced busing craze, intended to integrate schools, the ones who were being bused hated it more than those in the schools they were bused to.