I'm a tourist in my own country, I feel disoriented, lost, out of place.  Where do I belong?  In the stench of the bayou behind my house or in the sweet scents of vegan cookies in my co-op's kitchen?  Do I belong walking up and down the streets lined with lingering litter and tattered trash or do I belong strolling down the Row where all that's under my feet are the gently colored leaves of Autumn?  I wonder these things as I sit in a newly renovated Tresidder Student Center while reading about children dying on the streets as the tired working class custodial worker trudges back and forth with trash bin after trash bin. 

I'm a tourist in my own country when I walk into Ouisie's.  Yeah, you know, that yuppie restaurant in River Oaks (only the richest part of town) where I met Mrs. Smith and Melissa for lunch that Saturday.  I felt like a foreigner as I passed all those tables, as I ignored all those eyes, some perhaps wondering why I wasn't wearing white and serving lunch. 

And then I wonder where I belong in the utopia that is Stanford, because I am even a tourist at the Chicano/Latino ethnic center, in my house, in my room.  I never actually fit anywhere.  I am an amorphous entity slipping out of every mold.  I struggle still to find my place; to figure out where I will finally settle down in my own country; my home sweet democratic home, that claims to give me a voice when it talks to me face to face, but attempts to drown it out when I turn my back to it 

Sure, being a tourist in my own country can be a pain sometimes. My dark skin and dark eyes may encourage suspicion and speculation, but I'd rather be an exotic flower than a plain blade of grass among millions of identical blades. 

How long will I be a tourist in my own country?  Until others do not see me as a tourist?  As long as the memory of the corner drug deals and the graffiti stained walls live vividly in my thoughts?  Or will I only be a tourist until I dress in professional clothing and have my own office on the 65th floor of a skyscraper in downtown Houston? 

No, I will never lose my disorientation, but as time goes on I will learn how to use those traveler's checks, I will learn how to hold my teacup properly, I will learn which fork to use first, and I will learn how to talk to CEO's.  Should I learn to use the master's tools to prevent him from using me?  Or should I create my own to beat him down?  I ask myself this each Stanford day.  And even though the clientele of Ouisie's might still be curious by my soft brown if I ever walked in there again, could I have it any other way?