...stereotypes...

Currently listening to: Wishing You Were Somehow Here Again - Emmy Rossum

.docklands harbor.
Docklands, Melbourne, February 2 2008

I woke up today feeling a sudden burst of extreme hatred towards the scorching hot summer sunshine shining brightly outside my window, so hot and sunny it caused the indoor temperature in my room to rise mercilessly, forcing me to kick away my blanket and wake up with endless yawns and squinting eyes. Shoot.

Thank God it's February, and if I'm not mistaken, Autumn is coming soon. Hopefully in a few weeks' time, probably sooner. I can't wait to see all the leaves go red and yellow. *sighs* Summer's just not my thing, I guess.

Ouch, that reminds me. I'm gonna spend this year's Chinese New Year without the usual big family gathering and all-day good-food good-money good-angpao feast.
Oh well. Reality bites.

Anyways.
I was watching this brilliant guy in one of his Youtube videos talking about stereotypes. On a sidenote, he's an American-Born Chinese *blinks eye enviously* and the reality of living in America as an ABC is actually quite hard, because Americans are full of stereotypes. But then again I guess it happens likewise in all parts of the world as well, not excluding the dry and sunny Land Down Under in which I'm currently residing.

And, come to think of it. Though I am more commonly labeled various stereotypes by people surrounding me, especially non-Asians, even at the same time I do label people with stereotypes sometimes. Like, I almost always associate people with their typical background traits and make conclusions based on those traits.
Sounds Buyerbehavior-ish enough? *slaps myself*

Here are some of my most commonly-used stereotypes that come to mind.
May I confirm here beforehand that this post is NOT intended to offend or irritate people coming from certain ethnic groups or backgrounds whatsoever. *bows down*


Alright. Here goes.

1. Mainland Chinese people speak bad English

Oh my, I know this is so not true, but I can't help it! Like, I hang out with a lot of Mainland Chinese students in my college, even good friends with some of them, and even though I know for sure that not all of them speak un-polished, un-structured English, but, truth be told, most of them do. And this doesn't just happen around college, no. Even in Chinese restaurants, most of the people who work there can't even speak English at ALL. *sign language alert*

And I totally get the reason why they have such a hard time learning how to speak English properly. Thing is, they don't usually have English as a compulsory language subject in their previous education levels, and their Mandarin tongues make it harder for them to switch to English and speak coherently.

As a Chinese myself, though I consider myself lucky enough to have been able to master English from a very young age, I'm quite used to this fact. Like, some of my elder relatives are now actually trying to learn how to speak and read in English, and they face more or less the same obstacle; alphabets, pronunciation, vowel sounds, etc. Since, you know, Mandarin and English are two completely different languages.

It touches me to see how hard they're trying to improve, though. In ways unexpected, nonetheless. *laughs* And I appreciate their effort. I'm trying to get accustomed to hearing them speak so I can comprehend more of what they say, and when they ask me to correct their pronunciations (and sometimes they do ask), I'll gladly do so. *smiles*

Alright, moving on...


2. All Aussies say "G'day mate!" to each other and speak in endless outback slangs

Interestingly, I actually have a friend who's still planning to go down under to continue his study this year, and the first thing that he asked about Aussies during our conversation about random Aussie stuff was "Do Aussies say 'G'day mate!' every time and speak in incomprehensible slang tongues?"

Then I was like, "D-duh. No."
And it's actually true.

An Aussie friend of mine actually mentioned to me that all the so-called outback slangs printed all over souvenirs and shirts and merchandise goods and ads and promotional campaigns for Australia are in fact spoken alright, but the frequency and intensity of them being exchanged between Aussies in daily-life conversations are not as highly-anticipated as they seem to be for the outside world. At least not anymore, seeing that Aussie youth are becoming more and more Americanized day by day.

The accent is still there, though. Now that's an authentic fact.
If you happen to catch me talking to an Aussie, you'll notice the slight alteration of my tone.
Acculturation, perhaps? Or diffusion of cross-culture influences? *slaps myself again*


3. All Indonesian international students in Australia are rich, spoiled, lazy bastards

Alright.
The extended version of the above statement is "All Indonesian international students in Australia and the rest of the world are rich, spoiled, lazy bastards who got nothing to do than wasting parents' money, going clubbing, and f*cking themselves off to oblivion".

Cruel, yes. Not to mention horrendously freaky.
But ever since I got here, that's the impression people often make of me, sadly. After they correctly recognize me as an Indonesian, that is.

I'm gonna be honest here and say that some of those Indonesian students here ARE rich, spoiled, and lazy. Yet hey, stereotypically-speaking, I am an exception. At least I think I am, and I'm sure I am.

Like, yes some of us, I admit, have nothing better to do than acting spoiled, failing subjects and stuff, but MOST of us, meaning a major percentage of Indonesian students here, are actually NICE, in caps. We actually work hard, act nice, and succeed. All the social circles I'm in right now prove this thing right, that Indonesian students are in fact not all bastards.

Whew. Emotional. Hold back JJ hold back. *sighs*

Okay I should stop here before this thing gets out of hand. *laughs*

Bottom line, stereotypes can often be proven wrong.
Yet it is inevitable to keep trying too hard to prove them wrong.

And frankly, those typicalities are actually the basic, differentiating traits that every ethnic group has compared to each other. So in the end, let's not get offended and be proud of who we are instead, yeah?


Since when people recognize us as coming from a certain group with stereotypical backgrounds, at least they'll know who we are, where we come from. The good and the bad.

Before we can slam them down with the cold-hard facts of life and open their eyes, the starting point must be there. No matter how cold and untrue that is.

That's my thought for today.
Thanks for the amazing Kevjumba for inspiring me about this! *laughs*

Peace out, people!