A Letter to Asian Girls

[yuiyoshida]

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A Letter to Asian Girls

Have you ever wanted to wake up white?


A few years ago, I was on a date. It was 11pm; we were in the city and walking back to his place. My date, who later became my boyfriend, is a charming and intelligent African Australian, deeply attuned to his own racial identity – as you would have to be growing up brown in Australia. I am an Asian-Australian woman.

It was our third date. We were on Lonsdale Street when a group of loud, drunk white men stumbled in front of us. One of them turned to my partner and whisper-shouted, “Congratulations man, you got an Asian girl! How did you get an Asian girl? You’re Black.”

We looked at each other and kept walking. We were silent on the way home.

Outside his apartment, he turned to me and asked: “Is there anything you want me to say? When people call me the n-word on the street, there are certain words I want to hear from my friends. Is there anything I can do?”

More silence. I didn’t have an answer for him.

The night crawled. I told him, “Nothing. Don’t do anything, I don’t expect anything. I’m used to it.”



What I couldn’t tell him was that time I was eight-years-old and a white middle-aged man approached me in the supermarket. I was picking carrots for my mother when he told me,

continues...
https://nextshark.com/letter-asian-girls/

Editor’s Note: Caroline Wang is a Chinese-Australian university student living and studying in Melbourne. The views expressed in this piece are solely her own. This piece was originally published in Et Cetera, an Australian student publication, and republished with permission.

[thbobby]

1. Haters gonna hate

But who they really hate is themselves. I am a white man from North Texas. I have seen this kind of bullshit all my life. I guess I am sort of one myself because I hate what I call "white trash". Their actual thought process is: "I am a piece of shit, but at least I am better than ...". I don't really know what to say except not everyone is a hater. I am sorry for you, but keep believing in yourself, despite what haters say or do. Sometimes I am truly embarrassed by being white and "privileged".

[lostnfound]

2. I did not see this until now.

How important is your thread? Well, for an exhausted middle aged mom suffering the inability to understand her own teenager, it is extremely important. I have much to think about because of your stuff, not least of which is that intersectionality can be right in front of me and yet I don’t see it. For mothers, we love our children but do not see the world through their eyes. How eye-opening.

I am terribly sad to hear that you might stop posting here. I have really enjoyed so many of your posts, and have bookmarked some of them for later visits. Your reminders of Japanese culture make me happy, because Japan is my favorite culture. I grew up in the U.S., don’t have a drop of Japanese in my own ancestry, but my teen sure does.

Oddly this morning it hits me as, just another way that my world is falling apart.

Anyway you will be missed.

[PoorMonger]

3. This is heartbreaking

Especially the stuff about her being groped and attacked in front of her own mother and being told not to speak of it. You want to think that we as people are getting better with time but truly it’s just degees of improvement that can seem like nothing if you live with it so long.

I am only part Asian (1/4 Korean) from my grandma on my mother’s side. There is so much that I never got to ask her about her life and she passed from lupus when I was 14. She never liked to talk about her life before , though maybe I was just too shy to ask. Though when my mom’s family moved to Denver in the 70’s she made friends with some Japanese and Mexican women from the neighborhood.

Even only having 1/4th Asian ancestry I know plenty about the shit racism in middle America. The kids stretching their eyes and at you and saying Ching Chong jokes...

Interestingly I am also in an ethnic studies grad program ( with an undergrad in history) I never thought of ethnic studies as a specialization till one of my favorite professors told me I should consider it because I have always written passionately about racial issues. I think it’s fitting because in some way I can’t hide my indignation.

Anyway, thanks for sharing.