Big in China

I don’t know how to put this but, in China, I’m kind of a big deal. Well, not really. But, people do stare at me a lot. Like, a lot, a lot. I get stared at more here than the rest of my life combined.  Let me tell you a story to put this into perspective for you.

Recently, my husband, my mother-in-law, and I all went to the Great Wall. The Great Wall is a world renowned site, which attracts a huge amount of tourists every year. These tourists are both international and domestic tourists. Anyway, as we were admiring the Wall and taking pictures, a Chinese man approached my husband, Luiz, and asked “Will you take a picture?”  Now, if this was anywhere else, Luiz would have snapped a pic of the man and his family on the Great Wall and been done. Being China, however, this was not the case.  It turns out that the man wanted to take a picture of his son with Luiz. When my mother-in-law and I came a little closer to see what was happening, the man realized that there were three Westerners, not one. So, he eagerly asked if all three of us would be in the picture with his son. This man got distracted from the Great Wall of China to take a picture of three Western looking strangers.  Welcome to my life!

I’d like to say that this is the first time this has happened but, it’s not. I’ve been photographed by strangers several times. I’ve even been videotaped.  I also get stared at pretty much everywhere I go. Overall, most of the time, I don’t really pay attention to it. I do get nervous if I’m out alone and a group of men are staring too much. But, thus far, nothing has happened. In reality, most people take a second look and then ignore me. It’s only a special few who really stare at or photograph foreign strangers.

After looking at the numbers, it’s really not surprising that people have such a reaction to Westerners. From what I’ve read online, China has less than a million foreigners of all ethnicities. So, out of 1.3 billion people, that makes foreigners less than 0.07% of the population. It would be like if I saw an alien walk down my street. I’ve seen them depicted in movies but, never in real life. If this happened, I’d probably take some pictures too.  

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