this post was submitted on 04 Jul 2023
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It's far easier for an East Asian person to become integrated into a Western society than the other way around.
You can live in Japan/China/Korea for decades, be married and have children with a local, and speak the language fluently and people will still call you a foreigner to your face.
You can be born in a western country as an East Asian and still also be called a foreigner and asked where are you really from
Yes, you can.
But it's not as prevalent.
Agreed, I work with dozens of western Chinese, japanese and koreans every day.
My son is 50/50 Thai / English.
We live in Thailand and he is accepted as 100% Thai.
I admit that I'll never be accepted as Thai but that comes with benefits as well as drawbacks.
It's generally easier on the kids in Thailand, I think, because mixed race couples are more widely accepted there than in Japan/China/Korea.
I did a few years teaching ESL in Seoul and out of hundred kids, there were just two siblings that were mixed race - Korean mom and American Dad.
Even though these two kids looked basically Korean (except their hair was dark brown instead of black) and spoke fluent Korean, I was shocked that some of the other kids in the class referred to them as 외국인 (foreigners), the exact same word they used to refer to me as white man.
Pretty much why I was prepared to settle here.
Can confirm. Taught in Japan for 20 years. Married there, had 3 kids there, lived there for 24 years and even on the day we left I was called foreigner by parents whose kids I taught for 8 years. Even my colleagues I knew for 20 years called me it.
20 years in they used to ask stupid questions or on staff nights out thought hey were being PC by asking if we should eat at McDonalds for my benefit.
Lovely place, however its Institutionally racist to the core unfortunately. A westerner can never be accepted over there.
Whoops, double-posted.
It’s true that they’ll call you a “foreigner” to your face, but they don’t mean anything bad by it in most cases. It’s just a classification, understandable since these aren’t really “melting pot” nations. I’ve lived in all three places and never had anything but positive regard from people who see me as a foreigner. Even when I got arrested in Beijing, I was really impressed with how I was treated.
I never said they necessarily mean anything bad by it, though.
Regardless of whether your status as a foreigner is perceived as being positive or negative, you'll always be a foreigner.