Friday 9 March 2012

What is your Ethnicity?

Today I went to the NHS doctor to renew a prescription and the receptionist noticed she needed to fill in some more information on my profile in their system.

First question she asked - "What's your ethnicity?" I paused a second, isn't this obvious? Then she prompted, "British?" Oh boy.

My answer - "My ethnicity is Caucasian, nationality is American."

Apparently this did not compute in the system so she put me in as "Other White" and moved on to input that my primary language is English.

I might have been there a while longer if I had to explain that I have Irish, German, Norwegian and Czech blood.

I am used to the "Where are you from?" question now... but this was a new one for me. 100% ethnicity doesn't translate for an American mutt.

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