The topic: one of the main reasons I wanted to leave the "Middle Kingdom": Extra Attention
That may sound a little odd to you extroverts (supposedly the majority of Americans), but I'll explain what this attention entails and why, for me, it's mostly a bad thing that makes me want to buy automatic weapons.
First, I'll tell you in more detail how I feel about attention. Getting attention for an accomplishment is just fine. I like it. When I do a good job at work or come up with a good idea, please let me know; I'll appreciate it. Unwarranted attention is something else entirely. In the U.S., I don't really get much of that, which is great, but in China a lot of attention would be directed at me for being a U.S. citizen, a native speaker of English, and white (more specifically, non-Asian). Needless to say, these are not among my proudest accomplishments as the reason for each has to do with where my parents happened to be living when I popped out. I tried not to broadcast that I was from the U.S., but any Chinese can at least tell that I'm Western just by looking, and then make a lot of immediate judgments based on that.
It's understandable: the population of China is ninety-something percent Han Chinese, and of the other less-than-ten percent, many are virtually indistinguishable from Han Chinese in both appearance and culture (Manchu) or at the very least look very much like Han Chinese. In that kind of environment, how can you not make judgments based on race when seeing someone who looks different? All the same, I didn't like it. I often found myself wishing people would just not notice me.
But it was not to be. The staring persisted. Some say the staring is not so bad in the city and that it's much worse in the countryside. That's true, but it still happens in the city. A lot.
We've heard about what gracious hosts the Chinese were during the Olympics, but even in very modern Beijing, which I have been to several times, foreigners are bound to get stared at occasionally. I've heard defenses for this from foreigners and Chinese alike: "They are just curious. No harm is meant." That may well be true, but often those who stare appear incredulous. This is especially the case for senior citizens, who will often look a foreigner up and down very slowly. Young people who stare are different. They'll tend to have what appears to be a look of derision on their face if they stare, and if any of their buddies are around, there may be some whispering followed by rude laughter.
Towards the end of my time in China, I rarely went out, not just because Tianjin is a boring city, but because I wanted to escape all the laughs, stares, hellos, and snide comments. No doubt this sounds oversensitive or even paranoid to some, but it's all very real. This is pressure that I'd feel every day, and I know I wasn't alone because other expats I knew expressed similar angst. Some were perfectly able to ignore or even bask in all the extra attention, but I was not. And due to aforementioned racial homogeneity, there's little chance that I'd totally "fit in" in China anytime soon. This is not so much an attack on China or the Chinese as it is just explaining one reason why, in the end, China wasn't for me.
Counterpoint: Privilege
All the extra attention does mean that foreigners can get away with not doing much work. For example, foreigners make much higher salaries than locals simply because they are foreign. At one of the schools I worked at, I made 3,600 RMB per month plus housing and utilities for working about 10 hours a week. Not only that, but no one really cared about the job I did, and there was next to no oversight. Many Chinese teachers working full-time made around 2000 RMB per month (maybe less) and probably a few benefits that don't add up to much. Not a bad deal for me, right? But get this: my salary was considered pretty low for a foreigner. I'm sure my replacement makes even more (and probably does a better job, as well). I felt pretty bad about the situation, but some would argue that it's justified because that's what it takes to lure Westerners away from their cozy homes to teach at Chinese schools.
We've heard about what gracious hosts the Chinese were during the Olympics, but even in very modern Beijing, which I have been to several times, foreigners are bound to get stared at occasionally. I've heard defenses for this from foreigners and Chinese alike: "They are just curious. No harm is meant." That may well be true, but often those who stare appear incredulous. This is especially the case for senior citizens, who will often look a foreigner up and down very slowly. Young people who stare are different. They'll tend to have what appears to be a look of derision on their face if they stare, and if any of their buddies are around, there may be some whispering followed by rude laughter.
Towards the end of my time in China, I rarely went out, not just because Tianjin is a boring city, but because I wanted to escape all the laughs, stares, hellos, and snide comments. No doubt this sounds oversensitive or even paranoid to some, but it's all very real. This is pressure that I'd feel every day, and I know I wasn't alone because other expats I knew expressed similar angst. Some were perfectly able to ignore or even bask in all the extra attention, but I was not. And due to aforementioned racial homogeneity, there's little chance that I'd totally "fit in" in China anytime soon. This is not so much an attack on China or the Chinese as it is just explaining one reason why, in the end, China wasn't for me.
Counterpoint: Privilege
All the extra attention does mean that foreigners can get away with not doing much work. For example, foreigners make much higher salaries than locals simply because they are foreign. At one of the schools I worked at, I made 3,600 RMB per month plus housing and utilities for working about 10 hours a week. Not only that, but no one really cared about the job I did, and there was next to no oversight. Many Chinese teachers working full-time made around 2000 RMB per month (maybe less) and probably a few benefits that don't add up to much. Not a bad deal for me, right? But get this: my salary was considered pretty low for a foreigner. I'm sure my replacement makes even more (and probably does a better job, as well). I felt pretty bad about the situation, but some would argue that it's justified because that's what it takes to lure Westerners away from their cozy homes to teach at Chinese schools.
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