Who am I?

I went out with a friend over the weekend, and we had a nice time. He’s Brazilian and I met a few of her other Brazilian friends. One of his friends asked me “Are you Sri-Lankan?” I replied, “No, I’m Tamil.” His reply was, “isn’t that a language, not a place.” And, I told him, I do not identify as a Sri-Lankan, and I’m from Tamil Eelam. Now, explaining this to someone who is out of the loop in terms of current events is a bit difficult, but I feel I get into this conversation every time someone asks where I’m from. I gave him the short answer that I’m from Tamil Eelam, and that is the traditional homeland of the Tamils before it was unjustly colonialized by the British and then wrongly handed it over to the Sinhalese majority. So I asked him back, where he is from, and he said he’s Canadian (even though his parents are from Brazil).