NDN

If you've ever seen the above decal on U.S. cars, you may have wondered what it means, like me. Last week, I found out. My friend D was visiting from my all-time fave American metro NYC, and she and I went to Anaheim Hills to grab haircuts. Our hair was treated by this amazingly nice hairstylist, who at first glance, appeared as desi as they come.

So while he shampooed my hair, I asked him if he was Indian. He guffawed out loud, saying no one had said that to him before. He wasn't Indian, but NDN (pronounced like the letters) aka American Indian, which he prefers to the "corny" native American. His family has both Kumeyaay (tribe from San Diego) and Chumash (Santa Barbara) blood, and he himself is married to an Apache from New Mexico.

He was discernably proud of his heritage, and I asked him something that had been on my mind for a long time. "Don't you -- and other native Americans -- mind being referred to as 'Indian'?" He shook his head, saying that American Indians had made the term part of their identity a long time ago. He also told me a little of the history behind the word, as he understood it:

Apparently, Christopher Columbus who's credited with "discovering" America for Queen Isabella of Spain was Italian. So his Spanish, apparently, wasn't too hot, and in his journal, he wrote about discovering the children of God in America -- "in Dios" -- which somehow got corrupted to Indian. Also, he'd believed he'd reached India. So it was a combination of factors, he said.

Don't know how far this is true. But I finally get NDN.