[pulaskibush]

Arkansas Ping

[kcvl]

Gema Vargas, a senior at Mount Saint Mary, and Michelle McKenzie, a 2002 graduate, practice respiratory therapy during a summer class at UAMS.

[brytlea]

“People tend to put you in groups — Hispanic, African-American, white, whatever,” she said. “Hispanics tend to stick together like the other groups do.” Even after all the years she’s spent in Arkansas? “We still don’t fit. We don’t know where we belong.”

I have many hispanic friends, and I'm as white as you can get. It doesn't get in the way of our friendship. People put themselves into groups. There's not a darn thing the rest of us can do about it. If she wants to fit in with the larger society, she needs to stop thinking of herself as hispanic first and foremost. I'm so tired of people complaining about not fitting in.

susie