Disclaimer: This text is a bit made up and some characters have been changed to protect their privacy.
This started off as a simple day. But as the day progressed, it made way for two interesting occurrences.
Occurrence number one. Today, a bit out of the blue, a friend invited me to her house. The idea was just to spend a little bit of time together, what the locals usually call «hanging out». So my friend and I decided to watch a bit of UK TV. We thought we would find a vintage movie on Film4. Ideally, we were trying to find something made in Ealing Studios. 
Instead, we found a ridiculous amount of commercials. But the one that caught my attention was the Ancestry ad. It talked about how we can trace our family tree. Americans love doing that. And that’s why many end up visiting Ireland because they find out that an ancestor from the 1800s was from this region.
Occurrence number two. That evening I decided to call my brother. We had not spoken in months. It turns out he had just come back from this trip to Sweden (visiting our cousin) and was eager to talk. One conversation led to another until he finally started telling me something quite interesting.
He has actually taken a DNA test to see how much Spanish lineage he had. Beforehand he had secretly decided to do some research using the registry from the Mormon temples in Chile. They hold exhaustive records if you want to track your old relatives. Registering births, marriages and deaths. To his dismay that did not lead to much.
So he thought he might have better luck with the DNA kit. He sent a sample of his saliva (I know, gross) and the results showed up on the website. So obviously, 45% Andes aborigine. But surprisingly just 11% Iberian (Spanish). The rest was a mixture of italian, jewish, balkan and even a tiny amount of middle eastern. Needless to say he was surprised to say the least. What a weird bundle of ethnicities all rolled into one.
And mind you this is not always the case. Take the example of
Conan O’Brien. He jokes about the time he took a similar test. In his case the results showed he was 100% Irish descent. Of course, no surprise there. I mean have you seen the guy?
So, before settling for the night, I decided to think about these two occurrences. Family trees and DNA.
Generations and generations of immigrants have come to Chile. Also I had recently learnt a lot about immigration when visiting the Epic museum in Dublin.
Well,first of all, who are we but a funny mix race that defines us as South Americans. Don’t get me wrong, I am proud of my aboriginal roots. I am proud of the Andes. Such a magnificent natural sight and spectacular in size.
But I gotta be honest here. This Ethnically Ambiguous thing has really worked to my advantage. Because it has actually brought lots of roles as an extra. Considering I can be cast as a latino, middle eastern, italian, etc. Also it doesn’t hurt being taller than the average chilean and having long black hair. I know what you are thinking, now I’m just showing off.
Seriously, on a deeper more personal level, I have come to the realization that over half of my existence has been spent away from Chile. Which would make me a bit of a hybrid. But don’t get me started on that….
