Jimmy Yang - How to American

I finally became a US citizen in 2015. I had been qualified to become a US citizen for several years, but it cost $725 to file the paperwork. I wasn’t unpatriotic; I just didn’t have $725 to spare until 2015. The main differences between a US permanent resident with a green card and a US citizen are the right to vote, the right to sit on a hung jury and the right to not get deported if you claim you’re a US citizen at the Tijuana border. I was finally convinced that I needed to become a US citizen when a friend told me his buddy with a green card was deported after he was charged with domestic abuse. I wasn’t planning on beating my imaginary wife, but I realized I could have gotten deported for something trivially illegal like smoking weed in public. That wasn’t a chance I was willing to take. Just to be clear: domestic violence is terrible and all perpetrators should be deported to an island where they beat each other in a giant octagon, like a Thunderdome for assholes. All the logical factors aside, truthfully, I did feel a great sense of pride in finally becoming an American citizen.

To become a US citizen, I had to pass the civics test to prove that I had a good enough understanding of American history and the English language. I had to prepare for a Q&A from a booklet, “10 °Civics Questions.”

How many justices are on the Supreme Court?

What is the economic system of the United States?

What does the judicial branch do?

I have seen enough of the “Jaywalking” segment on The Tonight Show with Jay Leno to know that most US-born citizens wouldn’t know the answers to these questions. I had to study those questions like it was the SATs. They should have let me pass the test just based on the amount of Bud Light and American football I’d consumed over the last ten years. I think the test should have more relevant everyday American questions like:

What constitutes pass interference in the NFL?

What’s Snoop Dogg’s real name?

Who is Leonardo DiCaprio currently dating?

The NFL, Snoop and Leo are just as quintessentially American as the Supreme Court.

The test took place in a stuffy room inside of an old brick building in downtown Los Angeles. I don’t know why all government facilities have to look as dreadfully boring as possible. To properly welcome these potential new American citizens, the test should have taken place at a strip club. Leave a good impression and show everyone what America really has to offer. After an hour of sitting on the most uncomfortable government-issued plastic chair, they finally called my name: “Man… Shing… Ouuuuu… Yang?” It was exactly the same as my first day in school in America. “You can just call me Jimmy.” The lady who interviewed me was a woman with a thick Jamaican accent. I am pretty sure that I was more Americanized than my American-citizenship interviewer. I bet you she didn’t even know what constitutes pass interference in the NFL. I answered every question correctly like I was Ken Jennings on Jeopardy . After acing that test, I thought I’d get to meet the president and he’d congratulate me on my new citizenship. Instead, I had to wait another several months to become a US citizen at the naturalization ceremony. All I could think of during that time was, Don’t get arrested for smoking weed in public.

I was one of three thousand people from eighty different countries at the Los Angeles Convention Center for the naturalization ceremony. It was a magical moment for everyone. I was surrounded by soon-to-be US citizens of every color, race and religion. Sitting next to me was a Mexican couple in their sixties, behind me was a Persian dude who looked like a classmate from Beverly Hills High School and in front of me was an old Chinese couple who reminded me of my grandparents. It was truly a beautiful sight. People were crying from jubilation. Whatever journey they went through to become American citizens finally culminated in this moment that they shared with other fellow immigrants from all over the world. For me, it was especially sentimental because it meant I had $725 in my checking account. We sat down as a local politician took to the podium and congratulated us on this monumental day. Then they played a song accompanied by a music video on the big projector screen to welcome the three thousand newest citizens to the US of A. The video started with the classic eagle flying by, followed by beautiful farmland and a slow zoom-in shot of Mount Rushmore. Then the song came on.

“I’m proud to be an American where at least I know I’m free…”

The Mexican couple next to me put their hands on their chests as if it was the national anthem. I didn’t have the heart to tell them this wasn’t the “Star Spangled Banner”; it was Lee Greenwood’s “God Bless the USA.”

Everyone around me started to tear up, but I was too distracted by the crappy music video to be fully in touch with my emotions. Really, America? This is the best music video we have? Any music video from BET would be better than an eagle flying over an empty cornfield. Instead of Lee Greenwood’s “ God Bless the USA,” I suggest we play Jay-Z’s Big Pimpin’ at the naturalization ceremony. Instead of flying eagles and Mount Rushmore, it should be partying on a yacht, popping Cristal with bikini models. We should show the newly anointed American citizens what it truly means to live the American dream:

“We doin’ big pimpin’ up in N.Y.C. It’s just that jigga man, Pimp C, and B-U-N-B.”

I would have cried if they played that. God bless America.

Everyone congratulated me for becoming an American citizen. But I didn’t feel any different. I was still Asian. I was now officially an American person with an American passport, but I still looked like the same Asian kid who didn’t know the Pledge of Allegiance. Nobody in any part of the world is going to come up to me and say, “Hey, American guy! Cool passport! Rocky Balboa!” No, random people still look at me and holler, “Hey, Karate Kid!” “Jackie Chan!” “Bruce Lee!” The color of my passport doesn’t matter; most people will always see me as Asian before they’ll think I’m American. It’s hard to put ethnicities aside in the melting pot of America. Sometimes I identify so much with my ethnic background that I forget what I’m really about as a person.

I went to Winnipeg, Canada, for my first trip as an American citizen with my freshly minted US passport. It was for a weekend stand-up stint at the Rumor’s Comedy Club, opening up for Shawn Wayans from The Wayans Bros . I got off the plane and strutted through the border security with my beautiful blue passport. Finally, I’m an American that can’t be told to go back to where I came from by the border patrol. I laid my passport down in front of the Canadian border patrol officer like it was a badge of honor. She gave me a warm Canadian smile, probably impressed by how American I was. Then she flipped through the empty pages and looked at my name. It’s now Manshing Jimmy Ouyang; Jimmy is finally my official American middle name, not just a nickname. She looked up and asked, “So are you here for business or pleasure?” When I was young, I was taught by my parents to always say pleasure at border security for our family vacations. So I automatically replied, “Pleasure.” And I gave her a confident American grin. She asked:

“So what brought you here to Winnipeg?” Now I had to back up my pleasure story, but it’s okay. I’m a professional actor, I got this.

“Just to get away from LA, you know, all the craziness and traffic. I thought it’d be nice to go to somewhere quiet, and have a little vacation in Winnipeg.” Nailed it, Tom Hanks.