Let me be clear.
On this blog I am chronicling a particular kind of experience. I hope to connect with people who have shared this experience, or who are interested in examining the ways that race comes up in conversations between strangers, distinguishing between what is “acceptable” and what is “objectionable”, and lastly, how a person can deal with these situations, i.e. respond verbally, laugh it off, get angry, or accept it. It’s not a phenomenon unique to one race or culture; people of all colors show their biases toward/curiosity about/ignorance of people of all colors every single day. I know I make snap assumptions too, partly because the human brain is always trying to categorize people and things, and some of that categorization is informed by personal experience. I do try to maintain an awareness of my biases and piece together their origins.
As is probably clear, the way I process people’s reactions to me as a Chinese American woman ranges from amusement to irateness, and what I personally want to come to terms with through this blog is the exchanges that make me irate. I’m sometimes too caught off guard to respond to the person, and it’s not my nature to tell people off, and ideally I would want to make people aware of their assumptions/stereotypes without resorting to much confrontational language at all.
The experience I’m referring to, which on a small scale is interactions with strangers in which the stranger addresses my race, is on a larger scale the effect over time of a constant stream of such interactions. For me, I have become terribly sad that I am regularly assumed to be a foreigner in my own country; no matter how I speak, or dress, or where I live, the color of my skin is still foremost what some people see and process about me. Then I am also disheartened by assumptions made about Chinese people living in America (i.e. that we live in our specific ethnic enclaves and don’t speak English well). And I am most exasperated by the fact that most of these interactions are between me and a man, oftentimes in the form of a man saying something to my face right as he walks by (ni hao, konichiwa, hey china doll, etc), or saying something as I walk by him, or approaching me when I’m alone. Catcalls are one thing; a race-related comment said at close range can make me feel preyed upon.
And don’t get me started on comments that are tied up with sex and reflect the exoticizing of Asian women.
I don’t want to be the PC Police with everyone, including my friends who sometimes say things that rub me the wrong way. I am simply trying to meet kindred spirits and see new perspectives, not demonize people or places or cry victim or come off as morally superior.
A closing thought. Now that I’m in Hong Kong and, to borrow a term my cousin coined, an “undercover tourist,” it’s a different ballgame. If someone assumes I’m a Hong Kong native, I think, “Cool! I blend in!” And when people ask where I’m from, my reaction is, “Well, you guessed right, I am indeed not from here.” As I know I don’t “belong,” I am not nearly as sensitive about “Where you from?” However, if someone came up to me and said “Konichiwa” salaciously, or something dirty in English, I wouldn’t be too pleased.
I suppose it is often about the person’s intentions, and when I figure out tactful ways to respond verbally to these things, I will of course gauge whether something is said mockingly, out of ignorance, or (sadly) in an attempt to be funny. There’s a big difference between the guy who wants to practice some Chinese words with me at the deli, and the drunk asshole at the bar saying loudly to his friends, “Remember that time we went cruising for Asian girls?”
True story. Le sigh.
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Tags: chinese, conversations, hong kong, japanese, strangers, travel
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