Gabriela

– I am half Cuban and half Norwegian and have always lived in a split between the two. I don’t look Cuban, and I don’t look Norwegian. I usually say I’m American.

Gabriela's Cuban family on her father’s side has roots from Spain, while her mother’s family were Norwegian immigrants from Bergen who came to the Midwest in the 1800s.

– I have had much less to do with my Norwegian background than the Cuban. My father’s family had a dramatic story of escaping from communism in Cuba and making it in the United States. The Norwegian culture from my mother’s side came a little in the shadow of the Cuban culture in our home. We ate lefse, but that was about it, she recalls.

But when Gabriela started studying to major in film, she immersed herself in Scandinavian cinema and was an exchange student at the University of Copenhagen.

– I do not know if I would have done that without an affinity with Scandinavia, she says.

Gabriela went on to study multimedia journalism at the University of Washington.

As she gets older, her Norwegian identity is becoming stronger.

– The Norwegian part of me is more important now than it was when I was younger, she describes.

– It helps me make sense of a few things in my life. For example, how I look: I have very bright skin, yet have curls. I feel Cuban, speak fluently and know the culture. But I don’t look Cuban. When I am at a Mexican restaurant, I order the dishes with Spanish pronunciation because it is natural to me, but I have experienced waiters rolling their eyes and commenting things like "who is this gringa?" And again, I went to a very "white" high school, where I was called a "fake Latina", and someone said I just got in because I looked white. I began to understand that I am never going to fit in any box. Which is fine by me. I think my roots add more to me than they take away. By recognizing the Norwegian culture in me, it has helped me be proud of that as well.