Kindergarten Registration: White? Asian? Choices? Eskimo!

Heinrich Beck
Melville, NY

I am white. Both my parents are from Germany. I have reddish blonde hair and a red beard.
My wife is Okinawan (from Japan).

I went to register my older daughter for kindergarten, and they use “Power School” as an intake form.
My daughter looks much more like my wife, but talk to her for 30 seconds, and you know she is my daughter.
The very nice lady doing registrations asked me, “What is your child’s race”?
I was stunned. I never thought about it. I answered truthfully, “She was born in New York. She is an American.”
The lady said, “No, i mean “Caucasian”, “Asian”, etc…”
I said, “I am 100% white. My wife is 100% Asian, so she is half of both.”
I was getting annoyed and the nice lady could sense this. To take off the stress of the situation, she quickly added, “It doesn’t really matter” with a smile.

I said, “Ok, if it doesn’t really matter, what are the other choices?”
The nice lady read the list, and the last entry was ESKIMO.
I turned to my daughter and asked, “Hey Monika, do you want to be an Eskimo?”
My aspiring kindergartener promptly laughed, “Sure!”
I looked that the nice lady and said, “Make the kid an Eskimo!”