Even in a multicultural, polyglot city like L.A. (which has the largest population of Asian-Americans (1.4 million) in the country and where the percentage of the population which is Asian-American is roughly equal to that which is black) most discussions of race appear to still be framed in the outmoded, bipolar terms of  black and white.  For example, whereas a lot of people and many organizations honor Black History Month, Asian Pacific Islander American Heritage Month is almost completely unrecognized except by some Asian-Americans. The centuries-long struggle and strife of blacks in America is well-documented and worth honoring- but Asians have also been subjected to legal segregation, racist violence, widespread discrimination and harassment. So why is it that the Asian-American experience is so downplayed?

According to polls, 23% of Americans are uncomfortable voting for an Asian-American to be President of the United States. This is in contrast to 15% compared with an African-American candidate and 14% compared with a woman candidate. A lot of Asians are suspected and viewed of holding allegiances to Asia, and not the U.S. which plays into the "perpetual foreigner" syndrome. True, many Asians are more recent immigrants than the white or black population but even Asians born in America often speak, in my experience,  of "Americans" only in the third person. Last year, coming up with movies to showcase for APA Heritage Month resulted in the suggestion of Chinese Kung Fu movies the distinction between Asians in Asia and Asians in America remains a lot harder than distinguishing African-Americans from Africans or white people from Europeans partly because America loves Asian movies and Korean dramas seem to show at all hours of the day, but Hollywood almost never casts Asian-Americans in anything and, to date, there have only been three TV shows to focus on Asian-Americans.

    Hispanic Heritage Month began in 1968 as Hispanic Heritage Week. We never learned about it in my schools which prided themselves on being among the most progressive in the country. Every year we celebrated Black History month which began, amazingly, in 1926 as Negro History Week back when the Ku Klux Klan enjoyed its peak membership of 4 to 5 million people (or a whopping 15% of the nation's eligible men). Anyway, we students always raised the same questions. Is it in February because it's the shortest month? Where's Asian or Latino History Month? Where's White History Month?
I don't recall my teachers having the answers except that we learned plenty of white history year-round and Black History Month was a time to recognize the contributions of a people to American culture who'd been systematically ignored.
     So, this year I found out about Asian Pacific American Heritage month which began in 1978 and which I had NEVER heard mentioned. Some Asians I knew had. They said it was marked by more documentaries about Japanese Internment Camps being shown on PBS. At the same time I found out about Hispanic Heritage Month which I mentioned started in 1968 and which I'd also never heard about. 
     When I first moved to Los Angeles, I thought (educated mostly by Los Angeles' films and TV and music videos) that it was going to be 50% plastic people living in palatial homes, 25% Crips and 25% Bloods. I don't know any of those people except  O.G. Crip Greg "Batman" Davis who's one of the patron saints of Amoeba's Black Cinema section.
But that's pretty much what we were fed. And I thought, given it's famous palm trees, it would be steamy and sub-tropical like my former home in Florida.
     I got to Chino (which I figured was pretty close to the ocean) and drove to Pollo Loco in Chino Hills because I'd seen an ad in Spanish for it with a chihuahua that said a lot more than "Yo quiero Taco Bell" which piqued my interest.
     My friends in Chino and Pomona whom I'd met in Iowa showed me around. I flipped the radio stations and heard bandas, Vietnamese talk, ranchera (on the am), Korean music, norteñas and freestyle. The people I saw everywhere didn't look like the people I'd been led to believe I'd see. And it was dry and cold at night. I still get annoyed when (invariably white) people characterize Los Angeles as a soulless botox world of corporate chains and cultureless (and invariably white) people. It's almost as if you're not black or white, then you're invisible. The truth is that Los Angeles is probably the most ethnically (and culturally) diverse spot on the planet and possibly the universe. 46.5% of the population is Hispanic and/or Latino. Los Angeles was founded by the Spanish and then became part of Mexico with its independence. Following the rebellion of illegal American immigrants in Mexican Texas and it's subsequent secession, they tried the same thing in Mexican California. Maybe that's why some people are afraid of immigrants from the south. Maybe we/they have this cultural memory about when white people moved illegally to the area, refused to assimilate or even learn the language and then revolted with guns because the creator of the Universe always had this plan for white people to settle on the Pacific which he communicated to Andrew Jackson in a vision, I suppose.