Being Asian and always having lived on one of the two coasts in the U.S., I’ve definitely been sheltered in a lot of ways that most do not consciously think about. Sometimes, I forget that only 4 percent of the U.S. is Asian (not 30 percent like it may seen in California or New York), and that most people in this country not on one of these coasts don’t get to see people like me with my “exotic” features that regularly. So when traveling away from the coasts, I become the minority, the one who doesn’t blend in, and definitely the one who gets stared at more.