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- Feb 13, 2017
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啊，气死人!她不可以讲华语。我还以为她是华人 …“
It was a Tuesday. A Tuesday night, to be exact. I had rushed down from work to meet a beloved friend who had just flown in from Adelaide, South Australia. She had chosen the place for our dinner date because it needed to meet her religious and dietary requirements.
As I watched her fumble through the menu, dithering over whether to get an additional side of spring rolls, I heard the above comment quite audibly from behind me. It came from a Chinese waitress, who just a few minutes before had been smiling as she showed us to our tables. This smile had now flipped around, and she muttered under her breath as she tapped her pen impatiently against our order chit.
As soon as we decided, the waitress, now visibly irritated, snapped the menu shut and whisked our dinner orders to the kitchen before we could even thank her. I didn’t know if my friend had registered the tone in which that unwarranted comment was delivered, because she definitely would not have understood it—she spoke Malay, not Mandarin.
Incredulous, I thought, for a restaurant that was supposed to be serving up Halal-certified dishes for Singapore’s Malay community.
And that was also the day my eyes were opened.
“I don’t want to always be told … that my experiences and emotions of feeling excluded in such spaces are not valid.”
“Ah, so frustrating! She can’t speak Mandarin. And I thought she was Chinese …”
Now, this is an opening sentence you can understand if you’re not familiar with Mandarin.
As of 2018, the Chinese comprise 76.1% of our city-state’s 5.7 million residents. Growing up, I didn’t feel the need to question my Singaporean identity when people who looked like me were well-represented in all areas of society. Ethnic Chinese wield social, economic, and political dominance in Singapore, and it has always been easy to take for granted that I could get whatever I wanted, wherever I wanted.
Ordering my favourite yong tau foo from that exclusively Chinese-speaking hawker stall? No problem. Dithering over whether go with a mind-numbingly spicy mala or chicken broth for my hotpot dinner? In my broken Mandarin, I could still wrangle an unenthused smile from the impatient staff, along with a few recommendations.
Yet such smooth, painless, and sometimes even pleasant experiences don’t apply to everyone.
When I spoke to my dinner date Sharifah* about my observations that night, it surprised me that it came as no surprise to her. While the 24-year-old Singaporean is Malay, she essentially looks Chinese. And growing up, it has greatly impacted how she navigates public spaces in Singapore.
While ruminating on my observations, she thinks aloud, “I’m not surprised anymore. My inability to speak Mandarin always incites that kind of reaction, and it’s not a one-off mistake.”
“Most people tend to assume I can converse easily in Mandarin based on my appearance. It happens a lot when I interact with Chinese-owned businesses in Singapore, but particularly more so in restaurants,” she adds.
“Their reactions differ each time it finally hits them that I’m not Chinese and I cannot reply them in Mandarin. It changes in a snap second. Some look annoyed; some look bored. Most of the time, it’s usually the latter.”
When I ask if she ever feels welcome in such spaces, she replies, “No.”
Given the ethnic and cultural melting pot that is Singapore, along with the narratives of racial harmony and inclusion that are frequently peddled, it’s surprising to hear that any Singaporean can face such unpleasant experiences due solely to their race.
But before we break out in protest to argue, “Got such thing meh?” or, “Don’t anyhow say!”, we must understand the historical and social context of an experience such as Sharifah’s*.
More at https://sg.yahoo.com/style/not-chinese-singapore-probably-don-034949230.html
It was a Tuesday. A Tuesday night, to be exact. I had rushed down from work to meet a beloved friend who had just flown in from Adelaide, South Australia. She had chosen the place for our dinner date because it needed to meet her religious and dietary requirements.
As I watched her fumble through the menu, dithering over whether to get an additional side of spring rolls, I heard the above comment quite audibly from behind me. It came from a Chinese waitress, who just a few minutes before had been smiling as she showed us to our tables. This smile had now flipped around, and she muttered under her breath as she tapped her pen impatiently against our order chit.
As soon as we decided, the waitress, now visibly irritated, snapped the menu shut and whisked our dinner orders to the kitchen before we could even thank her. I didn’t know if my friend had registered the tone in which that unwarranted comment was delivered, because she definitely would not have understood it—she spoke Malay, not Mandarin.
Incredulous, I thought, for a restaurant that was supposed to be serving up Halal-certified dishes for Singapore’s Malay community.
And that was also the day my eyes were opened.
“I don’t want to always be told … that my experiences and emotions of feeling excluded in such spaces are not valid.”
“Ah, so frustrating! She can’t speak Mandarin. And I thought she was Chinese …”
Now, this is an opening sentence you can understand if you’re not familiar with Mandarin.
As of 2018, the Chinese comprise 76.1% of our city-state’s 5.7 million residents. Growing up, I didn’t feel the need to question my Singaporean identity when people who looked like me were well-represented in all areas of society. Ethnic Chinese wield social, economic, and political dominance in Singapore, and it has always been easy to take for granted that I could get whatever I wanted, wherever I wanted.
Ordering my favourite yong tau foo from that exclusively Chinese-speaking hawker stall? No problem. Dithering over whether go with a mind-numbingly spicy mala or chicken broth for my hotpot dinner? In my broken Mandarin, I could still wrangle an unenthused smile from the impatient staff, along with a few recommendations.
Yet such smooth, painless, and sometimes even pleasant experiences don’t apply to everyone.
When I spoke to my dinner date Sharifah* about my observations that night, it surprised me that it came as no surprise to her. While the 24-year-old Singaporean is Malay, she essentially looks Chinese. And growing up, it has greatly impacted how she navigates public spaces in Singapore.
While ruminating on my observations, she thinks aloud, “I’m not surprised anymore. My inability to speak Mandarin always incites that kind of reaction, and it’s not a one-off mistake.”
“Most people tend to assume I can converse easily in Mandarin based on my appearance. It happens a lot when I interact with Chinese-owned businesses in Singapore, but particularly more so in restaurants,” she adds.
“Their reactions differ each time it finally hits them that I’m not Chinese and I cannot reply them in Mandarin. It changes in a snap second. Some look annoyed; some look bored. Most of the time, it’s usually the latter.”
When I ask if she ever feels welcome in such spaces, she replies, “No.”
Given the ethnic and cultural melting pot that is Singapore, along with the narratives of racial harmony and inclusion that are frequently peddled, it’s surprising to hear that any Singaporean can face such unpleasant experiences due solely to their race.
But before we break out in protest to argue, “Got such thing meh?” or, “Don’t anyhow say!”, we must understand the historical and social context of an experience such as Sharifah’s*.
More at https://sg.yahoo.com/style/not-chinese-singapore-probably-don-034949230.html
