she would rise

Sankta, they cried. Sankta Alina.

nikolina appreciation week day one | summer solstice

SHADOW & BONE COUNTDOWN / DAY TWO / FAVORITE CAST MEMBER

‘‘Growing up, as a mixed-race person, I rarely saw anyone who looked like me, let alone Asian people, generally. And if they were on screen they were always a fairly two-dimensional role, a lot of times, especially in western TV shows and films. So I was so thrilled that they made this decision, and yeah, I was able to bring my own experiences. I think, for lots of people [who are] mixed-race or first-generation immigrants, you spend so much of your life not feeling like you belong anywhere. I certainly grew up in a predominantly white area, and I was always ‘the Chinese one’ to my white friends, but to my Asian friends and family, I was very English and you never really feel like you belong anywhere. And that is essentially Alina’s problem where we meet her. She doesn’t know where she belongs. She doesn’t know how important she is. It really shapes who she is, [in] the same way it does for me. My race is a big part of my life, but it’s not everything that I am, and they’ve done such a good job of making Alina’s background important to her as a character and important to shaping who she is, but it’s not everything that she is.’’

You and I are going to change the world.