Thursday, September 29, 2011
Ok, I get it, I am exotic
From all that I had read and heard about China, I knew that staring at foreigners is a pretty common practice. It is not considered rude to even point and stare. However, I thought that by foreigners it mainly referred to the westerners, the white people. I had no idea that I would be a rare species in China.
There are so many Indians in Georgia Tech/Atlanta. I think there are 150-200 Indians in all of Beijing. Effectively, there are more Indians in the ECE and CS departments at Tech. It was really unusual for me to be the only brown person. Arkansas was better than Beijing !
I had to get used to being stared at pretty soon. Usually I hang out with Warren and I always thought that people are staring at him because he is white. But I soon found out that I was wrong. The first time I took the subway by myself, I could notice all the lingering stares. For the first few times I always thought if something is wrong with my hair or if I have something on my face.
Since then, there have been several amusing instances with this whole staring business.
I was on my bike, waiting at the intersection and there were a bunch of Chinese construction workers crossing the road. As they walked in front of me, every single person turned their neck by 90 degrees to stare at me. And a few pointed too. Awkward.
Another time, I was leaving the dining hall from my bike and this little girl was having dinner with her family. As I was getting my bike out she saw me through the glass door and started pointing at me and then poking her family members to look at me. I waved at her and she broke down into a fit of giggles.
The most interesting incident was in the gym. I joined this private gym because you have to pay even at the school gym. Everyone at the gym is Chinese. I usually go with headphones on, so that I have the "please don't talk to me" look going. I am used to people staring at me in the gym. But on my second day, I was working out and see this person staring at me a little more intently than others. And then he walks up to me and starts talking to me. I still have my headphones on, so I remove them and he says namaste. He spoke English and told me that he watches Bollywood movies. It was a short conversation. However, that was not the interesting part. The interesting part was that as soon as the guy started talking to me, everyone in the gym was staring at us. The decibel level fell down significantly, no creaking of machines or the chinese white noise. This one person who was doing shoulder presses, *stopped* mid-way with his arms up to observe our interaction. And after my short conversation was over, they all just went back to their own business as this was an everyday thing.
I asked one of my Chinese friends what is the whole reason behind the staring business. I was curious if it was my recently cropped hair. He just told me that I am exotic here. I guess I am ...
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Tanu for what it's worth I have always thought you were exotic. No but seriously that would freak me out I'm impressed with how well you are handling it.
ReplyDeleteEspecially in the gym. I can't stand to have people watch me work out (the reason I never ran on the U of A campus because everyone would stare as you run by). I would resort to doing weightless exercises in my room before going to a gym where everyone watches me any day.
While people break out of it as adults in the States, it is also quite similar being among children in a school. My father tried to enroll me in a relatively exclusive religious private school when I first came. When we visited, this little boy came up to me, his eyes widened and then he started pointing at me and yelling at all his friends to come look at the Chinese girl. I ended up going to public school and while I never had a repeat of quite that magnitude, I can't count the number of times I was challenged to kung fu death matches.
ReplyDeleteIt's just lack of experience People break out of it as adults here before they have accumulated experience of encountering lots of different people over their lifetimes. They break out of it more quickly as children because their parents have also had more accumulated experience over their lifetime and can pass that on. Where as in China....well, honestly, I don't recall seeing a non-Chinese person in my neighborhood ever. The only time I saw people who didn't look like me was when we went to tourist-y places and once at a wedding at a nice hotel. And yes, I did stare.
:-) quite natural - but still, spooky. I think we used to stare at different-looking people in India too, esp as Children, before we learned it was rude to stare. :)
ReplyDeleteBravo to you for still going to the gym! I would've been too conscious!
Nice experience !! ;)
ReplyDeleteJacob - Thanks ! I guess I was considered exotic in AR too ;)
ReplyDeleteMei - Your explanation makes perfect sense. I guess being in the US changes perspective...