Anxiety before Moving to China

As I was sitting in front of a computer in Burkina Faso with an email saying, "Your application to transfer to China has been approved," my greatest anxiety about teaching English in China was I am Chinese American. Would my school accept me? Would they feel disappointed not receiving a stereotypical foreigner? Would they question my native oral English? Would they doubt my ability to teach English?

Arriving at my university in Gansu, I was accepted and welcomed with open arms. I was respected as a person who looks Chinese but who is American. Maybe I had an easy time because my university had paid teachers from the Philippines, so the school was used to the idea of Asian looking foreign teachers teaching English.

One thing that I had not considered was what it would feel like to be assumed to be Chinese and not American by fellow Peace Corps volunteers. I remember eating at a Chinese restaurant in Guinea and wrongly assumed that the African American volunteer was Guinean. I felt my shock at my inappropriate assumption.

While in Chengdu at PST, I was knitting in the lobby of the hotel. Sitting across from me was a white American Peace Corps volunteer.

He started a conversation in Chinese, "Hello. What are you knitting?"

I answered in my broken bad Chinese, "I am knitting a sweater."

Then because I knew he didn't know I was an American Peace Corps volunteer, I started speaking English.

He replied, "Wow your English is very good."

I replied, "Yeah I know."

He grinned and said, "You're a Peace Corps volunteer aren't you?"

Does it bother me that I am not a visible foreigner? Nah. I don't think I care, or do I?

After getting dehydrated from a 7 hour hike under clear sunny skies, I pedalled my bike to the first convenience store and bought a bottle of water. The woman said, "I feel that you are not Chinese. Where are you from?"

What about me caused her to think I wasn't from around these parts? Was it because I was wearing my poorly first ever knitted sweater that adult women rarely wear? In my Chinese city, I see children and men wearing hand knitted items. Students and women wear them a lot less. Was it my hiking gear, a waistpack rarely seen in my city? Actually, it probably was the bike helmet.

In Africa, I tried to blend in, wear African clothes, head wraps, cover my legs and arms. But I could never blend in because I was Chinese American.

In China, I do not try to blend in. I do not wear Chinese fashion. I do not wear my hair long. I do not try to lose weight to be skinny. Instead, I wear African clothes, hand knitted items, skirts that cover my ankles. I dress according to my own style instead of changing my style to fit into this culture. It doesn't matter though, my Asian features negate everything else, and most of the time I am assumed to be Chinese.

Maybe I'll write another blog How do I cope with people's assumptions that I am Chinese?