Yuen yeung
So, if you know the answer to Who Am I?, you’ll know I’m 30-something years old, a fan of science and tech and scared shitless about opening myself up online to whoever will listen. But I’m also a BBC, a British-Born Chinese guy born to parents who immigrated from the bustling streets of Hong Kong, and decided to start a family in a leafy suburb of a middle-class Home County. I don’t see this as determining trait of my existence but the seemingly contrasting and clashing of cultures is a constant, as I muddle my way through the murky waters of life, with the big questions niggling at the back of my mind.
Who am I? Where am I from? Where do I belong?
As a kid, this was never really an issue for me. I was brought up in a well-to-do Chinese family, with Chinese culture and values. It wasn’t until I was around 8 years old when I started to notice that I was… different.
At (English) school I was learning about different cultures and making friends with people of different ethnicities (though still mainly white). Academic-wise, I was slowly rising to the top of the class, though getting pipped to the post on many occasions. I was terrible at sports. Sucked at football and rugby and the popular playground games of It or Kiss Chase. British bulldog was a class favourite until it got unofficially banned. It wasn’t all fun and games though. The bullies reared their ugly heads even at that young an age, the largest of which, I remember vividly, decided to sit on me during one lunch time. Humiliation, shame and the crushing of self-esteem beame embedded in my psyche. Surprisingly, at the time, I never attributed it to my ethnicity. Maybe I was just too young to understand.
At home, I was (and still am) encouraged to speak Chinese with my mum, though my dad liked to speak English with me and my siblings. Back in the day, we would have rice nearly every meal and watch Chinese TV dramas in the evenings. On Saturdays I would go to Chinese School, with a bunch of other BBCs, to learn how to read and write Chinese, taught by parents of other BBCs, though we much preferred to play cards during class. On Sundays, I would hang out with cousins and play video games. I never had a games console growing up so when those moments came around, I absolutely and shamelessly had a ball. When I wasn’t playing with my cousins, my dad would take me cycling round the local parks and play football near the Scouts hall. Again, it never occurred to me that my time away from school was anything but normal.
My “Chineseness” and “Englishness” almost became two separate lives. They never coexisted and appeared to be as different as chalk and cheese. Looking back it never bothered me though. It just was what it was. I can’t say whether this was right or wrong but I wouldn’t change it. I didn’t yearn for a time when my English school friends would hang out with my Chinese school friends. But it just fascinates me how this separation of identities was so evident early on in my life and I just accepted it.
As a child I was so oblivious to it all. It wasn’t like I was embarrassed. I was kinda proud that I could speak Cantonese as well as English to be honest, albeit with an awful accent that was made fun of whenever I saw relatives in Hong Kong. But what I didn’t understand at the time was how it would affect me in my later life, my friendships, my relationships, people who I would meet and connect with.
Don’t get me wrong, I am immensely proud of my Chinese heritage as well as my upbringing in the British education system. I love that I have these multicultural roots, which are the foundation of my one true identity. I love being the one who can order dim sum in a Cantonese restaurant and I love that I have that dry, sarcastic British sense of humour. However, there are times when I struggle with it on a deeper level, where I wonder whether my exposure to Chinese culture in a British environment is enough for me to belong in the Chinese community, when I felt I didn’t belong in the British community. Not gonna lie, I often feel like I don’t belong to either. It’s a struggle that transcends what I look like and that becomes even more apparent in my adolescent and early adult years. I don’t think I have ever reconciled this and I don’t think I ever will. But it has made me feel incredibly adept at adapting to different social situations. Or so I think.
Since I can’t put my finger on any single nationality that I belong to, I kinda see myself as yuen yeung, coffee and tea, yin and yang, and I try to make the best of both worlds. I sometimes see it as a gift, though other times a burden (which you will hear a lot more of in other blogs). But ultimately, that’s who I am. And I don’t have to belong to either one. Why can’t I belong to both?
Do you have any early experiences of growing up with multiple cultures? How do you feel about it now? How would you do things differently, given what you have learned in your own experiences?
Just remember you are not alone. Leave a comment or drop me an email. Or don’t. It’s your life or whatever. Just be nice.
