Tales of a former rockstar.

The other day I had a nice little chat with a new staff member who recently started at my company. Her background is Chinese Malaysian, but she’s effectively full Australian. Like myself she had previously lived overseas (in England and Germany) and is also suffering from a permanent case of travel bug. I found it amusing that despite being completely Asian in appearance, because her parents had taken on Australian nationality, she was not able to get an international visa. I am always envious of people who have an international parent/grand-parent which allows them amazing visa options to go live somewhere else in the world. I had assumed that being Asian she would some way somehow maintain some link to possibly go live in Malaysia at the very least, but nope, there’s no chance.

So we were then discussing China, and I was talking about some of the things I had experienced over there. I was telling her about my teaching experience, and my classes of 55 kids and some of the challenges involved in handling them. And finally, we discussed how our trips to China would be vastly different. Despite the fact she is Australian, speaks perfect English (and no Mandarin), if she returned to the Chinese mainland where her ancestors came from, she would receive no special attention. She would simply look Chinese and that is effectively that. I on the other hand would almost be given celebrity status because of my pasty white skin.

In order to make sense of that, you really need to experience China for yourself. It is a country where foreigners are held in high regard and often given special attention. Of course this doesn’t apply to everything and you’re usually also a great big white target to be scammed, but a lot of the time, you feel important.

As the only 'whitey' in Beijing Aquarium that day, I swear she bee-lined to my whiteness to wave - but hey, maybe i was dreaming.

While less common in Shanghai, Beijing and likely Shenzen/Guangzhou, you’re stared at on a regular basis. Not just a sneaky peak from the corner of the eye, but a full body, mouth wide open stare. When you are dining in restaurants, people are trying to have a look at what you’re eating, and get some idea of your chopstick skills. When you’re in shops or supermarkets, the contents of your shopping bags become a magnet for the curious. You’ll often be asked to pose in a photo, or moreso, will notice people trying to take sneaky photos of you. You’ll have students approaching you wanting to practice their English, or lure you off to a scam tea ceremony.

All of the above was pure novelty for much of the time I spent living in China, though it did get old. In Xishan district Wuxi, most Chinese had never even left the area, so seeing real live white folk in the flesh was amazing. We would walk down a crowded street, and all eyes within a 100 metre radius would be firmly fixed on us (and not in a way that made us feel threatened..well mostly). It’s an experience you simply can’t have in most parts of the world, with even some of the most remote villages of Africa and South America still being tourist targets.

As time advances and China becomes even more modern, much of this will cease. There are of course many thousands of foreigners living in China, and even more there on a regular basis for business, but compared to the numbers of Chinese, this is definitely a minority. If you get over to China, embrace this particular experience as unless you’re somehow a TV or movie star, you’re not likely ever to get this kind of attention. For me, the most depressing part about the entire experience was returning home. When I stepped onto that plane, un-familiar with the white folk that filled half the seats, stepping into an airport that was again mostly white, the dominating emotion was one of nothingness. No-one was looking at me, no-one cared what I was wearing, how tall I was, how broad my shoulders were. Once more I was a nobody – the same as everyone else.

In beautiful LiJiang, when they're trying to take a sneaky photo, counter them by photographing them back! In their face!

Tags: Celebrity, chinese mainland, Chinese Malaysian, Foreigner in China, international visa, White Folk