I come from a mixed heritage: my mother is Korean and my father is British-Canadian. Throughout my childhood they told me I had the best of both worlds, but I quickly discovered I didn’t have enough of either.

I was born in a predominately white town in Northern Ontario. Surrounded by my white aunts, uncles and cousins, watching television programs devoid of Asian actors, I grew up believing I was white. This belief was quickly shattered by the word “chink,” which was hurled at me with alarming regularity throughout my first few years of public school. I couldn’t understand it. I wasn’t a chink—I wasn’t even Chinese. My mother didn’t like the small-town atmosphere where a person’s business quickly becomes everyone else’s and she decided to move us to Toronto.

I was soon enrolled at Christie Public School, which was proud of its distinction as the most multicultural school in the most multicultural city in North America. I became friends with people from all corners of the world and for the most part, race was a non-issue.

By now, I knew I was not white and wanted to learn more about my Korean heritage. As church is the weekly social-gathering place of the Korean community in Toronto, I began attending the local Korean church, where I ate brioche, sang songs about Jesus and met other Korean kids, who called me white-boy, honky and other such things.

I was confused. White people called me chink, Korean people called me honky. What the hell was I? Was this the best of both worlds?

I quickly learned I would never be fully accepted by any race. No matter where I go in the world, I do not fit in. In Greece I am a “kinezo”; in China I am a “gwai-lo.” (Don’t believe me? I was in Taiwan two years ago and was considered white by the people there. The white friends I was with were shocked—they saw me as Asian.)

The media is partially to blame for our perceptions of race. People are white, black, red or yellow. There is no room in the script for those who sit between the margins.

The arena of sports forces the media to embrace those of mixed race, but again, the racial labelling occurs. Tiger Woods is black, even though he is mixed and identifies more with his Asian heritage. Paul Kariya is Japanese, even though he is half-Ukrainian. As mixed people are still something of a novelty, a naming system has not yet been established. But should it be?

In Toronto “white” people have become a minority, but how do they determine who is or isn’t white? As mixed marriages are becoming increasingly more common, how will race be defined in the coming decades? Why does someone’s race have to be defined and why should race define who they are?

What will it be like when no one is truly white, yellow, red or black? Will we actually be able to say “I am Canadian” without having someone respond, “No, really, what’s your background?”