Scene: Easy Shop near Shipai station on Thursday.
Background: Allison is Caucasian, Grace and I are Asian.
The following conversation unfolds, in Mandarin, with the sales lady while Allison is trying stuff on in the dressing room.
Saleslady: Where are you guys from?
Me: The U.S.
Saleslady: Were you born there?
Grace: Yes, we grew up there.
Saleslady: Oh, but you’re both Taiwanese, right?
Grace: Yes.
Me: Yes, well, my mom’s Taiwanese.
Saleslady: And your friend?
Me: She’s from California
Saleslady: Oh, so she’s a real American (真的美國人), right?
[Grace and I exchange knowing glances]
Me (not attempting to correct her that we’re real Americans too): Yes.
This is a pretty common experience for me while traveling abroad. No one sees me as a “real” American because I’m Asian. When I traveled to India, my friend’s family whom we were staying with, kept asking where I was “from”. People in Spain tried to tell me I wasn’t really American (then they tried to tell me how the electoral college system worked in the States), and an Immigrations Officer in Fez adamantly asked 4 or 5 times what my nationality was. In the last scene, it wasn’t until my friend Lisa insisted for the 5th time, in French, that I was American, that the officer let me go.
So there you have it, another encounter loaded with underlying, sometimes unconscious biases based on race and geography. Come to think of it this isn’t really limited to when I travel abroad. There are Asian American friends who are floored to find out how “Asian” I am when they learn that I cook a lot of native Chinese dishes and shop at 99 Ranch. Other American friends have asked me to put a percentage on how Chinese and how American I am – as if it’s a sliding scale with an underlying assumption that being more of one thing implies being less of the other.
Overall, it’s generally pretty amusing, occasionally annoying but always thought provoking. It reminds me how deeply rooted our assumptions of nationality and race can be. It reminds me to remain aware of my own.
Today’s language lesson…
Phrase: Real American
In Chinese: 真的美國人
Pronunciation: zhen de mei guo ren
2 Comments
It’s unsettling to be perpetually balancing different worlds, isn’t it? You’d think we might be able to somehow outgrow or fully manage it, but it appears that it’s not possible when everyone out there has other ideas…
By the way, your photo’s not displaying properly.
Interesting. In Europe, I tend to have no problems being seen as an American. I remember driving into Austria and just flashing my passport and them letting me through. I also approached two Irish redheads once on a train from Basel to Paris and they immediately called me a Yank. In South America, no problems either. Granted, I haven’t really traveled in Asia much. Interesting divergent experiences (wonder if gender has to play with it??).