Don’t Tell Me ‘Your English is Good’

I was born in the United States, and though my heritage is Chinese, I identify myself as American first and foremost. That’s why I’m always surprised when someone says or does something regarding my race that is offensive. Sometimes it’s malicious, like being bullied for my ethnicity, while other times people meant well but were just ignorant.

It’s happened here even in diverse New York, like when a lady in line at the post office saw my daughter and said, “Wow, is that an Amerasian baby?” I didn’t even know what she was referring to as I had never heard that term. My child to me was just…my baby…that’s it.

Most of the time these incidents occurred in less diverse areas where I had lived or traveled to. My first job out of college was as a General Mills sales representative, and a promotion I received required a move to a small town along the Mississippi River located in the “boot heel” of Missouri (southeast corner).

I did not feel comfortable there because frankly, wherever I went people stared at me – not just for a second, but like the “just-too-long-to-be-normal” gawking. Whether going grocery shopping, eating at a restaurant or getting gas for my car, it was as if people had never seen an Asian before – and who knows, maybe they had never seen a “live” one.

Sometimes people had conversations with me like this:

Me: “I’d like to get these dry cleaned.”

Cashier: “Sure. By the way, your English is good.”
Me: “Um, okay. I was born here.”

Cashier: “Oh really? So what are you?”

Me: “Do you mean what is my heritage?”

Cashier: “Yeah, like where are you really from?”

It’s pretty obvious what’s wrong here, but the implications is that “your English is good for a foreigner,” and even after I say I was born here, the cashier implies I must actually be from another country.

Old Man: “Are you that oriental girl that works at McDonald’s?”

Me: “No.”
Old Man: “Really? You look like her. So you must be one of those exchange students from the college.”

Me: “No.”

Old Man: “Then what are you doing here?”

Me: “I work here.”

Old Man: “At the laundromat?”

Me: “No, I work for General Mills, and this is my sales region.”

Old Man (pauses, looks befuddled): “Do you know the people that own the Chinese restaurant in town? They’re oriental too.”

First off, don’t call Asians “Oriental” – that’s for objects like rugs and lamps, not a race and it was a term historically used to disparage Asian Americans. Secondly, not all people of the same race look the same and know each other. Thirdly, asking what I’m doing here if not an exchange student implies there’s no other reason for me to be living there.

These examples were made by people who may have believed they meant well but were limited in their awareness outside the bubble of their little world. It doesn’t make it less annoying. The reality is that there are United States citizens that are browner than others, and that doesn’t make them less American. After all, unless someone is Native American, we all originally came from another country.