When I show my Vietnamese friends photographs of me with people of Asian ethnicity, they always say something like, ?Oh! Is she Chinese?? If I explain that actually, she is American, they don?t quite believe me. It?s difficult for them to comprehend that in America, there are people of every skin color and ethnic background. For people in a mono-culture, nationality and ethnicity are one and the same.
Sometimes I don?t quite fit their paradigms:
1) Not a foreigner. I just learned that when I first came to Vinh, class 43 debated long and hard about whether or not I was really a foreigner. ?Because we know that foreigners are tall and big, and she is not?So we didn?t understand how she could be a foreigner.?
2) From Laos. ?Well, ok?she must be a foreigner. But she?s not a big foreigner. So maybe she?s from Laos. Laotians are sort of foreign.? I still get asked sometimes if I?m Vietnamese, or if I am from Laos
3)The strictest American. Class 44 now believes that I am American. But I?m not much like Brittany Spears. In fact, I dress so modestly that according to them, I ?must be the strictest American!?
4)A Baby. I?m not really sure how this fits culturally. Well, first of all, people in American usually think that I?m about 16. I was hoping that in Vietnam, people wouldn?t have the frame of reference to know that I look so much younger than I am. But in fact, people still ask if I?m in high school. And worse than that, they tell me that I look like a baby. That when I sleep, I look like a baby. That when I eat, my mouth looks like a baby. So perhaps I?m regressing.