I’m talking about after going through borders and I put away the US Passport…
And the average everyday people ask me “where are you from?”
Like if the place has anti-American sentinments, could I just pretend to be… not American…
cuz you know… the US has been getting a bad rap recently due to ahem a certain person in Capitol Hill…
Like most people in the world falsely assume “American” = “White” anyways…
They’d never suspect a thing… would they?
I can speak Cantonese and Mandarin… I can try faking a Chinese person’s accent when speaking English. Or pretend to be a Hong Konger (via the Cantonese). Or pretend to be Taiwanese (most people can’t tell the difference between the sound of Mainland Mandarin vs Taiwan Mandarin).
I heard that there are people who hate Chinese tourists… so is this actually gonna backfire?
But then again, I might also get hit with the double-whammy of “looking Chinese” while “acting like an American”.
So this is basically like code switching… but with national identity…
Is this morally okay? Or am I like crossing some ethical line here? Is this like the “cultural appropriation” thing where it’s inappropriate to do?
As a Canadian… Americans pretend to be Canadians abroad all the time. As a result, everyone thinks I’m American at first, until they realize I behave differently.
I can usually spot the American in a crowd, no matter their skin colour. It’s generally in the worldview they project.
I can also usually spot the Chinese in the crowd for the same reason.
Unless you can fake the “We’re the best” attitude instead of the “nobody’s better than I can be” attitude, I wouldn’t try to fake being Chinese in many places. You’ll just come off as fake.
Better to just be yourself and hold the views and attitudes you actually hold. If you’re worried about how others will receive that, just be more private with the personal information you share.