Generality:“Yellow”. 169
iven that I think anyone can say they’re Asian, but in the end it just
comes to where they are that affects who actually sees them as such.
When it comes to what brings them together, easiestis food and
cultural celebrations, or something else that is positiveand/or popular,
such as pretty celebrities or something, but eventhen, depending on
your approach and exposure to Asian culture even thatdiffers, and
ultimately, depending on who the people are, is onlyreally effective for
the short term.
Ethnicity|part1.
I’d say I’m Taiwanese Canadian (with no specific clarificationto whether
or not I think Taiwan is part of China). My parentsboth grew up in
Taiwan. My mother is descended fro. Mountain peopleand my father’s
family is from china. They have political disputessometimes.
I think to say that I’m Taiwanese would be prettyhuge but I couldn’t
deny that growing up in Canada for a good part ofmy life has affected
a lot of who I am, whether that be culture, mannerisms,stature,
language, whatever. I grew up thinking of myself asmostly Taiwanese
because of my parents’ role in identifying who I was,but the
knowledge that I couldn’t ever be Taiwanese becauseof my homeland
family’s reminder that I was a “foreigner child”.
To some extent I think my parents might’ve hoped theirchildren would
be like them or surpass them in some ways, but whenit comes to
identity I don’t think they anticipated how differentwe would be, so
learning to accept that sort of difference was somethingI needed to
grow into myself.
Ethnicity|part2.
I am both Taiwanese and Canadian. I cannot identifyabsolutely with
someone who had only grown up in or with influencesfrom only one of
those places. No mater what I do I’ll be recognizedas a little different
at least? Whether it be the utensils I use, how Idrink soup, the figures
of speech I might accidentally translate directly,or how I look. I find to
categorize myself as “Asian / North American” is theleast abrasive to
everyone’s views.
mchaos
(mchaos)
#1