1 . “What are you?” they ask. “Guess,” I say. Some suggest I have Japanese eyes. Others think I’m Filipino, maybe Indian. Few guess the truth: I am Mexican American. But it’s not like I’ve ever worn that name alone. I’m part of a younger generation of Americans whose identity is shaped neither by where we came from nor where we ended up.

My parents know the California immigrant experience first-hand. They grew up picking fruit in the San Joaquin Valley, knowing what it was to be poor, but also knowing what it was to be Mexican. Wanting a better life for their children, they went to college and got professional jobs. By the time I was born, they were fully accepted into the middle class. I grew up in the racially mixed zones of Sacramento, and when my parents talked of their years in the fields it was hard to connect those stories to where we found ourselves now.

By the time I reached my teens, difference had announced itself. We were all struggling for a sense of individuality, looking everywhere but where we came from. Identity became goods. Wearing certain clothes and liking certain kinds of music created social categories.

I became a junkman, sorting through the ruins of pop culture past looking for the pieces of myself. In love with the Beatles, I linked myself to England. Fascinated by Japanese cartoon, I took language classes at the local Buddhist temple.

I grew up American to a fault, rarely considering my own people’s culture and humanity. I left Sacramento and moved to San Francisco’s Mission District to put myself together again. There I first saw my people living in a separate community that had its own language, one I’d never learned. My brown face led people to ask me for directions in Spanish. I could only respond with a universally understood shrug.

“This is what I am,” I said to myself, looking at a street full of newly arrived immigrants. No, that wasn’t quite it. I corrected myself: “This is where I come from.”

Is it tragic that I grew up far from my mother culture, discovering it so late in life? I prefer to think that my American upbringing has taught me to apply insights from many different cultures to my everyday life. I am a product not just of Mexico or the U.S. but of the world as a whole.

1. Where does the writer grow up?

A．In Sacramento.	B．In a Mexico town.
C．In the San Joaquin Valley.	D．In San Francisco’s Mission District.

2. What did the writer learn from his American upbringing?

A．To promote mother culture.	B．To adapt to new surroundings.
C．To clearly express individuality.	D．To learn from different cultures.

3. You can infer from the article that the writer ________.

A．liked to play sports	B．wanted to learn Spanish
C．was interested in different cultures	D．did not like living in San Francisco

4. This article is mainly about ________.

A．the growing pains of immigrants	B．the culture differences in America
C．the author’s exploration of his identity	D．the problems of immigrants in America