So you want respect? Earn it bitch, don't talk about your country.

There was this incident that made the headlines for all the wrong reasons this week: a diplomatic row has exploded between China and Sweden after the alleged mistreatment of a family of Chinese tourists in Stockholm. This family consisting of a Chinese tourist Mr Zeng with his two elderly parents arrived at the Generator Hostel (rated two-stars) just after midnight with a booking on the same day, not realizing that the standard check-in time was 2 pm. So in fact, they had arrived 14 hours earlier than their check-in time, thus they were not given a room. What happened next is a bit fuzzy as there are two sides to the story: the Chinese tourist claimed that they had asked to wait in the lobby as his parents were unwell, but were violently ejected, subjected to police brutality and dumped near a cemetery by the police. Scenes of the police carrying his elderly parents out of the hostel had gone viral on social media all over the world. The hostel's side of the story was that they had initially allowed his parents to wait in the lobby whilst he went out into the streets of Stockholm to try to find somewhere else for them to stay for the night - he failed, but had met another Chinese tourist in the same situation. He then invited her to wait with his parents in the lobby of the hostel, but when the hostel realized that he had brought more people into the lobby, they changed their minds. That resulted in an angry confrontation where the Chinese tourists made threats at the staff, which left the staff no choice but to call the police. When the police asked the Chinese tourists to leave, they refused which led to them being ejected the way we've seen in the video. The Swedish police said that they deposited the family at a train station and the family were definitely not left in a cemetery as claimed.

This story has well and truly divided social media - on one hand, you have people lashing out at the Chinese tourists who were too cheap to book an extra night at the hostel. If they were rich enough to travel to Sweden, why were they staying at a cheap hostel and trying to talk their way into getting an extra night for free? Didn't they realize that the standard check in time at most hotels is around 2 pm, even in China? Did they think that they were going to be able to check-in anytime on the same calendar day and save money like that? Even if it was a genuine mistake, couldn't they have just paid for one more night or ask the staff to help them find another room elsewhere? And if Mr Zeng was responsible for taking care of his parents on this trip, how could he be so cheap and careless, leading to this situation happening? Thus many people on social media were blaming Mr Zeng for what had happened. Then of course, there were others on social media who blamed the Swedish police for being too heavy handed in the way the elderly parents were carried out of the hotel despite them being clearly in distress. I have a feeling that most of these people didn't even know the details of what happened in this case, but just jumped to the conclusion that the Swedish police were beating up Chinese people because they were racist (yeah, that's why social media drives me nuts - it is mostly populated by idiots). You see, these people are suffering from confirmation bias: they assume that white people are racist and they use any kind of evidence they come across to use as confirmation of their theories. And of course, because I struggle to read Chinese, my Chinese sucks: I don't go on Chinese social media and I am reading this mostly in English: it is not people in China who are posting things like that but rather English-speaking Chinese people in places like Singapore, Malaysia and HK.

I think the most disturbing post I read was a rant from a Singaporean woman who claimed that the Swedish police were racist towards Chinese people because they looked down on China - she then wrote an incredibly long, incoherent rant (in Singlish) about how China is the world's most powerful country, that China will dominate the world's economy in the future and how the policemen in Sweden are so poor they will never be able to afford a holiday in China, whilst this Chinese family are indeed rich enough to have a holiday in Sweden even if they weren't staying in a high class hotel. I didn't want to pick a fight with her on social media - I have much better things to do than to argue with someone who was clearly uneducated, bigoted and ignorant; but I want to lay out a few basic facts about this ridiculous assumption that so many Chinese and Singaporeans make about European people being racist. For those of you who are not familiar with my blog, I was born in Singapore: I spent the first 21 years of my life and the next 21 years in Europe, I'm now 42 years old so I am in a very good position to be a good judge of whether or not these accusations have any basis and of course, I have to say, they are complete bullshit. There are some pretty disturbing reasons why that Singaporean woman would project her own insecurities and try to seek confirmation of her very warped point of view from this incident in Stockholm.

Has racism got anything to do with what happened in Stockholm? Of course not. The hostel had the right to allow or refuse people who wish to camp overnight in their lobby - imagine if it was considered a public space, then the lobbies of all the nicest hotels in town would be full of homeless people who wish to sleep on the comfortable sofas for the night, especially in a place like Sweden where the winters can be very cold. No, hotels are in fact private property and they have the right to choose whom they allow to come into the hotel - usually, in most busy hotels, nobody would stop you if you were to walk into the lobby, perhaps you're there to visit a gift shop or eat at one of their restaurants so we're just quite used to coming and going from hotels unchallenged, whether or not we're actually staying there. Most hotels would have everything from restaurants to spas to cafes to gift shops, so they are quite used to people coming in and out of the hotel; hence so in general, hotels tend to be very relaxed about the lobby area, but that doesn't change the fact that they still have the right to extend or withdraw permission when it comes to people camping overnight in their lobbies. The Zeng family had simply refused to see things from the point of view of the hotel or the police - that's simply not the way you solve any kind of problem or resolve any kind of conflict and I don't know if it is cultural, but I have met a lot of Chinese people who come across as very autistic in the way they simply refuse to see the other person's point of view.

Mr Zeng had absolutely no dignity in the way he just sat down on the pavement in Stockholm and cried loudly like a baby when he didn't get his way. Good grief. Doesn't he have any sense of shame? Look, there are ways and means to reason with a hotel when things don't go right and crying loudly like a baby is not the way sensible people do things. When I was in Barcelona earlier this year, I had requested a change of room as the room I was initially given was very noisy - the front desk staff told me to pack up my luggage and the housekeeping lady would move my bags to the new room whilst I was at my conference. When I returned to the hotel that night, I realized that my laptop had been damaged and I accused the housekeeping lady of damaging it when she moved my bags - there was no CCTV of her dropping my bags and it was my word versus her. I got an apology and an offer of a discount towards my next stay at the hotel - I didn't accept it, I said no, I want compensation and they said we'll get back to you on that. So I went on the offensive and left them several bad reviews online to get their attention, it worked: we negotiated a 'compensation' for my laptop (not of the full value as it was an old laptop but it was a reasonable figure) and in exchange, I would withdraw the bad reviews. I got what I wanted, they paid up, I removed the bad reviews and I was very satisfied with the outcome despite the fact that I really had no solid evidence to blame on the housekeeping lady. That's how you resolve a dispute with a hotel - you don't use tears or tantrums, you use social media. Mind you, I had resolved a similar dispute with a restaurant in London the very same way - I got a full refund, plus a free dinner for two in exchange for simply withdrawing a few bad reviews.

The one thing that does irk me is the way that the Chinese tourists played the race card, then so many people went along with it, assuming that it was racism rather than questioning the dishonest and poor behaviour of the Chinese tourists. This is very clearly demonstrated by a video taken by a bystander who witnessed the incident and filmed it (see below): in this video, Mr Zeng screaming and shouting in the streets, when the Swedish policewoman approached him to calm him down and to reason with him, he fell to the ground crying loudly. Mr Zeng then had the audacity to claim that he was being beaten by the police, whilst the video had clearly shown that this wasn't the case at all - but it was bad acting on his part to try to justify his claim of police brutality. It was clear that the Swedish police and the hostel in question had done absolutely nothing wrong and the fault lay entirely with the Zeng family. However, when it is clear that you're entirely at fault, Chinese people like to play the race card which is entirely ludicrous - the fact that there had been an outpouring of anger in China against Sweden and the Chinese government had even taken this family's complaint seriously is shameful. It shows that Chinese people are not only irrational and unreasonable, but they have a huge chip on their shoulders when it comes to comparing themselves to their white counterparts in the West. This whole incident makes Chinese people look really bad and you wonder why so many countries have a terrible impression of Chinese tourists.

I have traveled to not just Sweden but all over Northern Europe a lot and have never ever once encountered any racism at all. Just this year alone, I've been to Finland twice, Sweden and Estonia on two separate long trips - once for work and once for a holiday. If you want to be treated like a VIP in Stockholm, the solution is simple: pay for it. I recommend the Grand Hotel in Stockholm, it is a five star hotel and the staff will treat all paying customers with such respect to ensure that they always have good reviews in the age of social media. It is also of course, the one of the most expensive hotel in Stockholm. Well that's what rich people do when they travel - they fly first class (or at least business class), they only stay at luxury hotels and resorts, they dine at fine restaurants and they are treated like VIP because they pay for it. If you are a backpacker staying at one of the cheapest hostels, then don't expect people to give you the same kind of VIP treatment - you get what you pay for. This is why we call it a service industry: the staff at the five-star hotel are not nice to you because they respect the fact that China is a rising economic superpower, hell no. They are so nice because that's what they're paid to do, it's just a part of their job for them. I found this America where the waiters were extra friendly - are they actually trying to be my friend? Hell no, they're just trying to make me happy so I will leave them a generous tip. But nonetheless, the warmth of their American hospitality creates a very pleasant experience for me as a customer.

Should people who stay at cheap hostels be treated like crap by the staff? When I was much younger, I had the experience of backpacking my way around Sri Lanka using only public transport. I suffered from severe food poisoning, was bitten by an insane amount of insects and got lost so many times - yet the genuine hospitality of the people was one of the highlights of the trip. I didn't stay in particularly nice guest houses and no the service wasn't great at times. Gosh, I remember once I turned up at the guest house in Unawatuna beach and there was nobody there - I wandered down the road and asked a man in a shop if he knew where the owner was, he spoke little English but I think this must have happened quite a few times already - he made a phone call to the owner of the guesthouse and sure enough, within 15 minutes the owner came back. I could have been upset but I was just grateful to the man at the shop and I made sure I spent some money at his shop. Yeah, that would have never happened if I had stayed in a 5-star hotel, but that's the kind of thing that comes with the territory when you decide to rough it and go budget. I was a strong young man then (with a full head of hair in those photos), I'm not sure I want to do that kind of holiday again today. Nonetheless, there is a direct correlation between the quality of the service and the amount of money you pay. A 5-star resort will have staff available to help you 24 hours a day, whilst a guesthouse in a remote Sri Lankan beach is run by one old man who may disappear for a few hours on end: you get what you pay for and this has absolutely nothing to do with your skin colour or racism.

Some Chinese people have criticized the way the elderly parents were carried out of the hostel in Stockholm - but allow me to be the voice of reason. The elderly parents had the opportunity to walk calmly out of the hostel when the staff asked them to; by the time the police were called, it had become evidently clear that they were not going to be allowed to stay for the night as they had abused and exhausted whatever goodwill there was from the staff there. But what did they have to gain by being uncooperative and difficult with the police? Would they have dared to have behaved like that in China, where the police are a lot more heavy handed than the Swedish police? Heck, the police in China would not have hesitated to have been a lot more rough with them. Should we then allow the elderly to be disruptive and create a ruckus in the middle of the night? No, the elderly have to obey the law like everyone else and being old doesn't give you the right to bend or break the rules. The Zeng parents should have been jailed for being so uncooperative and disruptive and I really don't give a fuck that they're old - their behaviour is disgraceful. This is what I utterly despise about Chinese culture where respect is given unconditionally to the elderly: that's plain stupid! This aspect of Chinese culture is seriously fucked up. If the elderly wanna behave like the Zengs, then they are not worthy of respect - let me be the first to kick them out and I'd gladly throw them into the cold streets of Stockholm. In the West, respect is earned, not given away unconditionally to the people who don't deserve it: you don't get away with stupid shit like that just because you're old.

Is there any real racism in the West? Yes, but there's so little that it is often wildly exaggerated by those who strongly believe that white people are racist. A good example of someone like that is my father - now my Chinese father is extremely racist towards anyone who isn't Chinese: oh he hates Malays, Indians, Africans, Arabs and white people all the same. A lot of this racism is based on this assumption of mutual hatred: if you hate someone so much, a logical assumption on that basis is that they will hate you in return. Our neighbour Mrs Fong in Singapore once told us a story about how she had bad service whilst on holiday in Europe back in the 1980s - I actually have a much clearer memory of what she told me, but my dad memory isn't that good.; each time the issue of racism came up, he would attempt to retell the story but it would come out somewhat different each time. Where was Mrs Fong? Was she in Greece or France? Was she in a restaurant or a hotel? Was she refused service or overcharged? Was she alone or was she with her husband? My dad would then make up the facts each time and I finally had enough of his racist bullshit - the last time he tried to do that, I gave him the death stare and pointed out to him that his son has lived in Europe for 21 years - why don't you ask me what I feel about the issue of racism in the West? Why are you relying on this one story that Mrs Fong told you in the 1980s that you can't even remember? Are you afraid that you will tell you that you're totally wrong, that racism doesn't exist - that in fact you're the one being racist? Have I told him about the fact that I had experienced virtually no racism in 21 years? Of course, but he conveniently shoves that into his blind spot and focuses on that one story from the 1980s from Mrs Fong that he can't even remember - racists don't like to be challenged and be told that they're wrong. 

Has my father ever suffered any racism? No, not at all - but let me give you an example of how some people choose to play the race card when it is clearly their fault. In 1985, we were on holiday in Las Vegas when we frequented this restaurant at the hotel we were staying in. There was a salad bar and if you ordered a main course like a steak or the roast chicken, you could help yourself to a bowl of salad. However, if you only ordered say a slice of cake, a bowl of soup or a sandwich, then you would have to pay extra for a visit to the salad bar. My father had assumed that as long as you order something, you could go help yourself to the salad bar - so one day when we were in there for lunch, we had placed our orders and none of us had ordered a main course that came with a free salad. My father then disappeared to the toilet and returned with a bowl of salad - when the waiter returned with our food, he politely apologized and said, "I'm terribly sorry but I'm going to have to charge you for that salad as you didn't order a main course." Oh boy, that made my father so angry. Did my father admit that he was confused about when you could get a free salad and when you had to pay for it? Nope, he placed all the blame on the poor waiter and said that if we had been white, we would have gotten the salad for free but he charged us extra and was rude to us because we were Chinese. Of course, none of my father's racist allegations were true - it was lie, after lie, after lie and yet the fact that the rest of the family were there and witnessed exactly what happened didn't stop him from reshaping the story to suit his narrative that white people in America are racists when really, nothing that happened in that Las Vegas restaurant had anything to do with racism.

My father can't read English (the same way I can't read Chinese), usually when he has an official letter that comes to him from say the bank or the government, he would give it to someone like my mother or my sister and ask them to translate it for him. So going back to the Las Vegas restaurant, they had photographs in the menu, so the tourists who struggled with English could just point to the photo of the dish they wanted to order without having to speak any English to the waiter. I was 9 years old when we were in that Las Vegas restaurant and even then, I did try to explain to my father why he was mistaken about the salad. But of course, it boiled down to the fact that even as a 9 year old kid, I was able to read an understand a menu in English and my father couldn't as a grown man - it was a source of embarrassment and shame for him. Thus rather than admit that he should have consulted his children over the menu which he couldn't read, he chose to believe that he was a blameless victim of racism which is of course, totally ludicrous as there wasn't any racism involved in that incident at all. My father's actions were downright stupid because the salad only costed a few dollars - it was not like we couldn't afford it and it was a very nice salad I would have gladly paid for. Yet he chose to let the memory of that event taint what would have been a very nice family vacation - so when people asked him, "how was your long holiday in America?" He would tell that story instead of talking about the many fun things we did in America.

When you get caught doing something wrong, some people choose to play the victim card - or in this case, the race card - rather than admit that they were in the wrong and accept responsibility for the mistake. So if someone like my father was told about what happened in Stockholm, he would probably say, "white people are all so racist! I encountered racism too when I was in America!" And unfortunately with social media, people tend to look for stories that confirm their long held beliefs, rather than allow themselves to be challenged. But as for the Singaporeans who were attacking the Swedish police for 'looking down on Chinese people', this probably reflects a lot more on their own personal circumstances. You see, I go to a lot of events like exhibitions, conferences and drinks parties as part of my job: networking is crucial in my industry and I actually really enjoy meeting new people like this. At a recent event in London, I met a good looking Belgian guy I got along really well with - we're both French speaking and I have worked in Belgium. During the lunch break, this really odd guy joined us at our table and I began to make polite conversation with this odd guy. He spoke English with an accent and he claimed he was from France - yet when my Belgian friend switched to French, he had trouble understanding his French and I thought, woah a French person who doesn't speak French? No you're not French - you're probably from somewhere like Russia, Bulgaria or Macedonia but would rather pass yourself off as French. The conversation then switched back to English and I asked him what his company did, again I couldn't get a coherent answer out of him. And all this while, I couldn't help but notice that his clothes were incredibly mismatched - but I thought he may have been colour blind and that was the least of his worries anyway. Oh did I mention that he had bad breath?

The conversation got so awkward that he said he was going to go get a drink but never returned - my Belgian friend then said, "I think he just wandered off the street and was after a free meal, he definitely isn't part of the event." Now clearly, this odd guy totally failed to make an impression with my Belgian friend and I - I am sure he must have panicked when he realized that we were both spoke French fluently. You see, if you want people to have a good impression of you - you can't just wave a passport around and claim, "I come from a rich country, therefore you must respect me!" No, instead you have to earn respect through your actions and conduct. After all, there are nasty people in rich countries that don't deserve any respect and there are incredible people in poor countries that are extremely admirable. Now the problem with some Chinese people is that they have probably done so little in their lives that is worthy of respect: they probably struggled through school and ended up in a lowly paid job. They are probably in debt and have a boss who bullies them at work all the time - their personal circumstances are probably quite pathetic and sadly they've done nothing to command any respect on a personal level. In fact they are probably quite embarrassed to talk about themselves: that's why they would rather try to derive pride from something like China's glorious culture or economic prowess. But that's when I have to draw a line between respecting Chinese culture and giving anyone unconditional respect on the basis of their nationality and/or skin colour: I expect each individual to earn my respect. The Belgian guy I met is incredible and I do hope we will do a project together before the end of the year - he certainly won my respect and the feeling is mutual.

So all this talk about Swedish people looking down on Chinese people is complete bullshit - like for crying out aloud, the population of China is currently 1.415 billion, as if you can treat Chinese people as a monolithic entity! There are some very rich Chinese people in the big tier one cities like Beijing, Shanghai and Shenzhen, then there are still some incredibly poor rural provinces where Chinese people are living in abject poverty. Anyone with half a brain will realize that there are both rich and poor people in China, the same way there are rich and poor people in any country in the world. So people would look down on you if you're poor, if you act like an idiot, if you're inarticulate and do stupid shit - but nobody would look down on you simply on the basis of the colour of your skin. I have been to Sweden so many times and have always been treated very well by the Swedes for a simple reason: I carry myself with dignity and yes, sometimes I'm happy to pay good money at high class establishments to be treated like a VIP. I don't do stupid shit - I am polite, I treat the Swedish people with respect and in turn they treat me very well. So it really doesn't matter whether or not the Chinese economy is booming, how's your personal financial situation then? What is your personal net worth? How much money are you earning? Are you crazy rich or very poor? Are you overdrawn and in debt or are you a multimillionaire? You see, when people look down on the Zeng family, it's not about the colour of their skin - it's about their cheap behaviour. It's personal, we look down on them because they're the scum of society; it's definitely not racism.

There's one more point I wanted to address: can a Swedish police officer like the ones as seen in the video afford a holiday in China? The answer is yes, definitely. The average annual salary of a police officer like that in Sweden is high: the starting annual salary is about 325,000 SEK (equivalent of £28,200 or S$50,000) rising to 558,000 SEK (equivalent £48,500 or S$86,500) - you see, Sweden is a very left-wing, socialist country and that ensures that people like the police are very well paid compared to their counterparts elsewhere. It is one of the best countries to be a police officer as you're unlikely to find better conditions elsewhere and on that salary (with 25 days of paid vacation a year), yes they can easily afford an exotic holiday in China. The key cost is the flight to get from Sweden to China - after that, prices are generally low and quite affordable in China for Swedish tourists. On the other hand, in China, the salaries of the police varies: you get paid more in a big city like Shenzhen or Beijing, compared to the counterparts working in remote villages in the countryside but they are shockingly poor compared to their Swedish counterparts, with some making about 28,000 RMB a year, or £3,150 or S$5,550. Thus it is highly unlikely that a policeman in China would ever be able to afford a trip to a country like Sweden, where prices are generally a lot higher than you would find in China. No, they probably would never be able to travel abroad on a policeman's salary in China. So let's not forget that despite China's impressive recent economic advances, Sweden is still a country that is much richer than China and China has a very long way to catch up.

Before I finish, I just want to mention Gui Minhai - a naturalized Swedish citizen who has been kidnapped by the Chinese government and the Dalai Lama's recent visit to Sweden. This isn't the first incident that has sparked friction between Sweden and China, but it does seem that Beijing has overacted over this incident and many have seen this as the last straw that broke the camel's back.  So that's it from me on this issue, what do you think about this story? Have you ever encountered ugly Chinese tourists abroad? How do you think the Swedish police handled this incident? Why do so many Chinese people have such a chip on their shoulders when it comes to assuming that white people look down on them? And seriously, like what the fuck is wrong with Chinese society, how can anyone offer any kind of sympathy or support to the disgusting Zeng family? Let me know what you think and leave a comment below please. Many thanks for reading.