The Shrine

i don't like my neighborhood...

the guy i think is a drug dealer down the street keeps staring at me when i walk by and has tried to pick fights on a few occasions...

the mexican guy i was trying to speak spanish to to practice at my neighborhood cafe today pretty much ignored me except to say "not a lot of people like you in east l.a." (meaning white people...not that this is even east l.a., i dunno what he was talking about)

*sigh*...single not quite tear at the corner of eye...

Damn dude, what kinda neighborhood you livng in? Try to find some place not in the ghetto. Of course, this being LA and all, that may be the only affordable place around.

"What the hell am I, doing drinking in LA at 26?" - Bram Van 3000

Get the hell out of there.

That sucks. Some people can be like that. They don't know any better. Expecting mean people to not be jerks is like expecting a cactus not to grow needles.

Get out of the neighborhood if you can afford it. It seems like there's quite a lot of racial tension where you live. I know what it's like, being white, to be blamed for all of the idiocy performed by people with my same skin color... Only in St. Louis, I got the hatred from african americans and not from Mexicans. All you can really do is not play the role that they expect you to play. Be calm and return hostility with kindness (or indifference if you can't manage kindness) and understanding. Getting angry is the worst thing that you can do, you just give the person stereotyping you more fuel for their hatred.

Practicing their own language is probably not recommended. It's a sign of trying to "fit it" and doing it badly.

Sine, I'm not trying to fit in, I'm just trying to learn. It's almost impossible to really learn a new language without constant practice.

I know. It's just what they think from their POV.