Salt Lake event serves up diversity

As the seven other people at my table look in my direction, I nervously contemplate for a moment how I define myself in terms of "diversity." I've got three minutes to talk about it.

I start out telling them about how, as a reporter, I often find myself searching for a common bond as I try to understand people from a variety of walks of life. I also talk about the dichotomy of trying to understand the LDS culture in my reporting as a non-Mormon reporter working for a church-owned newspaper.

We're sitting together at a recent Diversity Dinner, hosted by Salt Lake County as a way to build bonds within the community.

The room is filled with about 250 people, who are admittedly self-selected. People had to reserve their spot with the Mayor's Office of Diversity. However, organizer Rebecca Sanchez says the broader community impact will hopefully be a "ripple effect."

"We do something that a good friend or someone who we trust says, 'You've got to try this,"' she said. "There were some people there I know were kind of on the fence about (diversity) things, and I said, 'Just give it a try.' That's the idea."

Each table was filled with people of very different backgrounds. The participants were curious to learn more about others' stories. They also eagerly leapt when they discovered common experiences, such as the experience many at the table had of being single children.

At mine, there's an American woman who grew up in France and married an Iranian man, and a Filipino-American who first encountered discrimination at a St. George restaurant. There's also the director of the University of Utah theater department and a Chicana woman who says for people of color, "diversity is who you are."

There's also a Latino man who grew up Catholic in East Carbon and now has LDS children. And a local director of the American Diabetes Association, who found herself out of place in the dominant LDS culture when she first moved here from California, and a proud Greek woman who works with refugees.

The idea for such a gathering came from Elise Lazar some 15 years ago after a family her husband met while traveling i the Ukraine called and asked if they could visit for three months.

"They stayed and lived with us for 3 1/2 years," Lazar told the audience. "I can't say the experience was not without its challenges, but it was for the most part wonderful .... It showed me how important it is to invite people who are not like you into your life."

We're all here seeking a connection, wanting to share and learn from each other's experiences. And it was a learning experience — instead of "speed dating," this was "speed diversity," we joked.

Being asked to talk about myself for three minutes at a time was a bit intimidating. As a reporter I'm used to a more one-sided Q&A.

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