"But you are Chinese, right?"

Guys guys guys... let me get this off my chest. Today, in a conversation with some white friends, my friend (let's call him Mr Oslo for he is from Norway) made a terrible cultural faux pas. He said, in reference to me, "Whereas there are people like you from China who..." He didn't get to finish his sentence. I exploded with such rage. Not going to repeat what I said but needless to say, it was angry.

I may be Chinese but I am most certainly not from China.

Gosh, I was surprised at just how angry I got with Mr Oslo. I calmed down and he said, "Well, I'm Norwegian but people always say I am Swedish, I know what you mean and how you feel." His friend then stepped in and said, "Look, I have worked with him for years - I know he would never be deliberately racist. I know he would never deliberately insult someone unless they were really asking for it. It was a slip of the tongue, a minor faux pas, with possibly an unwitting lack of cultural sensitivity. Please don't take it personal, he's a truly nice guy, and harmless"

I had to explain to my friend why I was so offended by the label "from China" - firstly, I was born and raised in Singapore. As for my parents, my dad was born in Malaysia, my mother was born in Singapore. All four of my grandparents were born somewhere in British-Malaya (as it was known then) as were their parents. You have to go back pretty far in order to find an ancestor of mine who was actually born in China. Clearly, given that I was in fact born and raised in Singapore (and not China) - I am clearly not from China.

My friend did then ask a question, "But you are Chinese right?"

Well I obviously look Chinese... so people make assumptions.

I then had to explain the difference between being Chinese (ie. your ethnicity) and being from China (ie. your nationality) Indeed, you can be from China (ie. a PRC national with a PRC passport) but still be of a non-Han Chinese ethnic minority (Tibetan, Uyghur, Manchurian, Korean, Mongolian etc). So whilst I do have Chinese blood by virtue of my Chinese ancestry (and I do have a Chinese surname),  I further explained that one's ethnicity is a function of one's cultural identity, rather than a function of one's skin colour or one's parents.

I had recently worked in Manchester on a BBC radio 4 project which dealt with the British couples who have adopted of Chinese baby girls from China. I spoke to one such couple who have two daughters, both of whom were adopted from Sha'anxi province in China. They shed some very interesting light on how he had tried to cope with the challenges of trying to help their daughters keep in touch with their Chinese roots. I am going to transcribe part of our chat here to illustrate a point about one's ethnicity and how it relates to one's cultural identity.

Dad: Obviously we're white and English - that's why we decided that if we were going to do this, we were going to adopt not one by two Chinese girls, so the family would be half Chinese half English, that would be the right kind of balance we would like. We've both made an effort to study Mandarin and are quite fluent today in Mandarin - although admittedly we struggle to read and write sometimes, but when it comes to speaking, yeah we have been able to have long conversations in Mandarin without using any English at all. Our daughters go for Mandarin lessons twice a week.

The entire family is learning Mandarin!

Limpeh: How are you daughters coping with the Mandarin lessons? 

Mum: Not bad...

Dad: Not great...

Mum: Well, I'm surprised. To be honest, I think I'm actually coping better than them with Chinese and I am so glad I am in a position to be able to help them with their Chinese homework. Our older girl Felicity hates Chinese lessons so much, she really doesn't want to do it and we've had to almost bribe her to do it. Like, "if you go to Chinese lessons, then we're go for ice cream after the lesson." Otherwise she would refuse, she would cry, she would throw tantrums... Our younger daughter Esther doesn't have that problem - I think she just wants to irk Felicity by doing the exact opposite. She does her Chinese home work and is making good progress with her Mandarin. 

Dad: I think Felicity is old enough to understand that she was abandoned as a baby in China, she was not an orphan. Her parents gave her up as they wanted a boy, so they just left her as a baby... 

Mum: She was just a few days old. 

Felicity had a rough start to life in China. 

Dad: She had a rough start to life, the staff at the institute found her one cold January morning - her face dusted with fresh snow. No note, no name, nothing. Just a baby girl wrapped in a small blanket left at the doorstep. The person who left her there didn't even knock on the door - if Felicity didn't start crying and attracted the attention of the staff, she may have frozen to death. She asked so we told her about the story - well, we left out the more unpleasant parts. But you can see why she associates China with this culture where she wasn't valued or loved as a girl and why she has such negative feelings about China and being Chinese. 

Mum: Otherwise, she's a lovely girl - intelligent, funny, pretty, popular at school. She just hates going for Chinese lessons and we've taken the girls on holiday to China a few times. Esther was great, she enjoyed everything from the food to the sights whilst Felicity was very difficult on those trips. But what can we do? 

Limpeh: You've made an incredible effort in terms of trying to help your daughters maintain some kind of connection with their Chinese roots - can you explain what your motivations are? 

How could Felicity and Esther maintain a connection with their Chinese roots?

Dad: We've talked about this before we adopted the girls - we knew there would be cultural challenges associated with bringing up two adopted Chinese girls in England, so we wanted to bridge the gap in whatever way we could and if it meant us learning Chinese, then we were prepared to do that. We also don't want them to turn around one day and say, "why didn't you give me the chance to learn Chinese?" We want them to come to terms with who they are and being able to speak the language is a big part of that process. We can't help them come to terms with their identity, but we want to give them the most important tool to be able to do so - the language. 

Mum: Felicity is having a hard time trying to do that - but she's 14 now and you know, we try our best and we have struck a deal with her. If she passes her GSCE Chinese, then that's it, no more Chinese lessons. It sounds almost cliché, but I said to her so many times, "one day you will thank me for this". I genuinely believe it is true, I wouldn't force her to do something she doesn't enjoy without good reason. 

Limpeh: What is her response to your "one day you will thank me for this"? 

Mum: She would say that I am wrong. But I know I am right. I hope I am right. She told me, "If you want to learn Chinese, then you learn Chinese - don't make me do it for your sake." She's struggling with Chinese you know, I don't know if she's just bad with languages or if she has a mental block with it...

Felicity is struggling with the Chinese language.

Dad: She's doing great with French at school though. 

Mum: Yes she is, of course. She is great at French. She says French is easier than Chinese. 

Limpeh: Of course it is. Chinese is one of the hardest languages to learn for those who speak English as a first language. Felicity is 14, you must realize that at that age, she is beginning to figure out who she is - what her tastes are in fashion, culture, music, food... Teenagers tend to want to be able to be free to figure this out for themselves without their parents trying to make those decisions on their behalf. How old is Esther? 

Dad: She's ten. 

Limpeh: Right, at ten, she's far more child like - she would be more interested in seeking parental approval than trying to express her own identity. Perhaps you need to allow Felicity to make her own choices, trust her and if she doesn't want to learn Chinese, then try to channel that time and energy into something else positive and constructive that she likes, maybe in music or sports. 

So what if Felicity doesn't want to learn Chinese?

Mum: To be honest, I don't know for how much longer I can make Felicity continue studying Chinese... it's become such an issue at home. 

Limpeh: Our ethnic identity should be defined by our skin colour, rather they are a sum of our cultural experiences. I'm sure as loving parents, you've given her great experiences and plenty of happy memories. I'm sure you celebrate Christmas, right? 

Dad: Yes, they love Christmas. We go up to my mother's house and they love spending Christmas with grandma. 

Limpeh: Right, as long as those experiences are happy, they can mould your daughter's cultural identity in a positive and constructive way. I say, it doesn't matter where Felicity draws inspiration from in life, as long as they motivate her the right way and turns her into a confident, happy young adult - does it really matter if those inspirations are Eastern or Western? The fact is, she is a British girl who has grown up in England. Of course the bulk of her cultural experiences that define her are going to be British or European - learning Chinese as a foreign language isn't going to compensate for that fact that she didn't grow up in China. You can't change that, but you can take pride in having been great parents who have done a great job so far. 

Felicity enjoys Christmas with her grandmother. 

Mum: But she is Chinese, right? She is from China... she looks Chinese. What are people going to say if she can't speak Chinese? 

Limpeh: She is Felicity. She is an individual, a young person who will decide for herself what she wants to do in her life. Her birth parents may have given her certain traits like the colour of her hair, the shape of her eyes - maybe she has some personality traits from her birth parents. But you can't inherit a culture or a language like that - it is something you have to experience for yourself for it to become a part of your life. But you're her parents now, you're not her cultural guardians. You've set her up well, taken good care of her, raised her, educated her - now it is up to her what she wishes to study or pursue in her life. If she is not interested in studying Chinese or learning about Chinese culture... well, I can think of a lot of Chinese people who speak Chinese because of their parents, but they couldn't be less interested in their Chinese cultural roots. It's their choice. 

Heck, I speak Welsh and take such a keen interest in Welsh culture despite not having a drop of Welsh blood in me. I have met so many Welsh people who don't speak a word of Welsh or even know that much about their cultural roots. It's their choice - they can take an interest, they can learn their language but they don't. Likewise, so many Canadians and Americans with very European (French, German, Slavic, Spanish, Italian but NOT English) sounding surnames - but they barely know more than a few words of their European 'mother tongue' as they grew up in North America speaking only English. This happens a lot around the world you know? 

Yes I do speak several languages. 

Dad: But you're Chinese, right? Do you feel that Chinese people should know their own language and culture? 

Limpeh: I feel that everyone should learn important things about the world around them, so as to enable them to function as a useful member of their society and participate in social life. For Felicity, that means gaining the skills, knowledge and languages through education to enable her to do what she wants to do as a young British person living in England - rather than a Chinese citizen living in somewhere like Beijing or Shanghai. Now how she decides to relate to her Chinese roots is for her to decide really and it may be something she will decide to explore later in her life. Maybe when she becomes a mother one day, the issue may come up again as having a baby may make her think about her Chinese roots again - but again, that is for her to decide, not for you. 

So there you go - Felicity and Esther may have been born in China, but having been adopted as babies by this English couple, clearly their cultural identity is English (despite the Mandarin classes which Felicity hates). Think about this for a moment - how would someone like Felicity react to the label 'Chinese'? I often use this analogy to explain this concept to people: think about a cup. What kind of cup is it? In Felicity's case, it is a Chinese tea cup. She looks Chinese because her birth parents are Chinese. The cup is not empty, what is in the cup? The water in the cup represents the cultural contents of Felicity's life, the sum of her cultural experiences as a young teenager who has grown up in England. It represents the education she has had, her interaction with her friends & family, the books she has read, the TV programmes and films she has watched,  the various memorable events she has participated in from school sports days to birthday celebrations to festive holidays. Hence despite her parents' efforts, the bulk of these cultural experiences are all distinctively British/European because she lives in England.

Felicity's cultural experiences and influences are primarily British. 

So we have an Chinese tea-cup filled with a very English drink - like elderflower cordial, but her parents have mixed in some Chinese tea into Felicity's tea cup. It is an interesting mix which has made Felicity the person she is and at 14, the time has come for her parents to let go and allow her to decide what kind of cultural content to fill her cup with. It may be a scary experience for her parents to let go and trust their daughter to make her own choices like that - but that is something all parents have to do at some point as their children grow up.

Indeed, as a person who has grown up in Singapore and then gone on to live and work in so many different countries in Europe, Asia and the Middle East - like Felicity, I am like a Chinese tea cup on the outside. When you see my face, you can see that I look Chinese. But the contents of my cup, like Felicity, is very mixed. Many people in this world are either monolingual or simply do not speak a second language competently, hence the kind of media they can access is therefore limited to what they can understand by default. For example, my dad is your typical older Singaporean-Chinese man - he is fluent in Mandarin (along with Hakka, Cantonese and Hokkien), has a decent standard of Malay but knows only a little English. Thus the cultural contents he consume are virtually all communicated with the Chinese language (mostly in Mandarin) - he doesn't like watching English programmes on TV as he can't be bothered with subtitles (and not all programmes are subtitled). He cannot read an English newspaper or magazine. So there is a very strong correlation between his ethnicity and his cultural experience because of his language skills (quite specifically, his inability to understand even basic English).

Can you differentiate the cup and the contents of the cup?

Whereas I am pretty much the total opposite - I speak ten languages competently and get by in a lot more. If you were to look at my playlist on my iPod, you will find music in over ten languages from Welsh to Turkish to Korean to Spanish to Russian. I enjoy watching movies from all over the world - being able to speak this many languages has allowed me to enjoy cultural experiences far beyond what my father could with his two languages. Hence like Felicity, my Chinese tea cup has been filled with a most bizarre mix that I can only describe as an international cocktail of culture - and this has made me the person I am.

I know of people who are mixed, but even such people tend to default to one dominant culture. Take my friend Katja for example - she is half German, half Nigerian but she grew up in Germany. She is as German as they come. Her Nigerian mother went to Germany as a child and so Katja is completely assimilated. Furthermore, there were no other Nigerian or African people in the small town in Germany where Katja grew up, so it was a part of her mother's culture she never got to know. The cultural contents of Katja's life are pretty much German - that's quite different from someone like myself who isn't mixed (in terms of my bloodline), but has learnt many foreign languages and actively sought foreign cultural experiences to enrich my life. Katja is the complete opposite of myself - she looks mixed but her cultural identity is not; whilst I look plain old Chinese, but my cultural identity is very mixed. Everyone is an individual, unique and complex in our own ways.

Regardless of her parentage, Katja is as German as they come. 

I like Katja, she is a good friend and as our friendship grows, I get to understand her as a person - I treat her like an individual rather than try to slap a simplistic label on her like "German", "African" or "Nigerian". Likewise, Katja knows me well and would never slap a simplistic label on me like "Chinese", "Asian" or "British". This is why I got so angry and offended by Mr Oslo when he had the nerve to use the term "from China" when talking to me - especially since we've known each other for over 2 years and I would've liked to believe that he would've known me a lot better over those 2 years to avoid using such labels to describe me.

Anyway, I tried to explain all this to Mr Oslo but he wasn't interested. He insisted that he wasn't a racist - he said, "okay so you're not from China, but you are Chinese - what's the big deal? Is there such a big difference? Why are you kicking up such a big fuss?" I explained that someone who was a Chinese person from China would have a very different cultural identity and that wasn't the person I was. I felt that he had conveniently and lazily shoved me in a box marked 'China' and that wasn't right. I then told him that he had a chance to apologize for his cultural faux pas and that he had caused offence - he refused. Then relented, "If it helps you sleep better at night then I am sorry, but you're being a real drama queen about this and I don't get offended if someone calls me Swedish, Belgian or German or whatever nationality - it's just a mistake people make, it's not the same as being racist."

How do you feel about your nationality? 

I explained to him that I wasn't accusing him of being racist but rather, he was insensitive to my feelings. Even if he didn't mind people getting his nationality wrong, he should not make any assumptions about how I felt about the same issue. He retaliated with more abuse and that was when I draw the line and said "if you are unwilling to respect my feelings not just on this issue or any issue - then I'm afraid we have no basis for any kind of friendship." I walked away and he didn't say anything. I got home later and removed him as a friend on Facebook. Tough shit, I have standards when it comes to my friends and Mr Oslo has failed to respect my feelings on this instance. After all, it wasn't for him to decide when I had the right to get offended or not - he didn't care when my feelings were hurt and I don't need people like that in my life. If a friend I cared about told me that I had hurt his feelings, even if I didn't intend to do it, I would apologize and explain that it wasn't intentional because I care about the feelings of my friends. Good bye Mr Oslo. I know you're not a racist, you're just not the kind of person I want as a friend.