Differences Between Latinos In US And Latinos In Latin America

The title of this book made me think of my personal experience in the way that I felt I was perceived by Latino Americans in New York in contrast to those in Latin America. My father was born in Colombia and moved with his parents to New York when he was a boy while my mother is white and was born in New York. I look like I have South American roots, but growing up in the Bronx I rarely felt part of the Latino culture around me because though my skin is bronze, people treated me as though my style is "white". By "white" they mean that I appear to have a more hippie/funky feel than the more common look of the Bronx and my passion for environmentalism stuck out in such an urban environment. It never made sense to me why I felt isolated from the Latino community and I wasn't sure if it was my own insecurity that made me feel excluded or if I was in fact being rejected on a certain level by my peers. By in my mind my passion for the mountains and the inspiration for how I dressed came from the stories my grandfather told me about Colombia and the colors and flavors and love for the land which he described so in my heart I was embracing my background although there weren't many Latinos around me that looked and acted the way I did.
When I lived in Nicaragua for a few months while studying during college I felt a sense of acceptance as a Colombian which I had never experienced in the Bronx. I realized it was because in Latin American countries there are all the different styles of dress and way of acting that there are in the US, but these roles are all filled by Latinos. In the Bronx there is a more dominant style, what most would refer to as the "ghetto look" of tight blue jeans, dark jackets, hoop earrings and stylish sneakers and variations on that theme. So people in the city associate this style with Latinos, though from what I have seen in Nicaragua and Colombia few people in those countries would dress that way. Which is why it was in Nicaraguan that for the first time I did not feel my inferiority complex of not being "Colombian enough".
These observations mainly have to deal with my own issues of identity and loving my Colombian blood even though I am still struggling to become fluent in the Spanish my father never taught me and how incredible it felt at the age of 20 to truly feel loved for just being myself. It took living in a different country to feel that way, but upon returning to the Bronx I have been able to maintain that comfort and remember that my love for my grandfather is my love for his country, for our country which no one can deny me. And more importantly which I should not fear to deny myself.
Have others felt these conflicts of identity in terms of style between Latino communities in the US and Latin America itself?

I can relate to this Zoe. Even being Latino and brought up in the Bronx, I never identified with Latinos. For one, I did not speak Spanish, I have mixed heritage, and my friends where white and black. Right there you can see a telling combination.

I met other Latinos in High School, and I sucked at handball. Wearing big nerdy glasses and being shy did not help either. Even today, that urban ghetto look popular with many Latinos is not my style. I never owned a sports jersey, and bought my first baseball cap maybe a year ago - and I'm 36! Anything Latino about me was either learned later or was a matter of association by dating Latinas or going clubbing.

Cheers!