Staring

People love to stare here in Yuen Long. The reason is rather obvious considering that I will run into approximately 2 Caucasians while walking around the city each day. The interesting part for me has been that while the stares almost always begin with me they are transferred to Heleina, where they rest longer than on me. I am not sure why people are more interested in the type of Chinese girl who would marry a foreigner rather than the foreigner himself. You can also see how much my marriage to Heleina does not fit with expectations from another walking insight. Heleina’s aunt was showing us around the neighborhood where we will live and as we walked through crowded sidewalks, you have to weave between people and groups. My assumption is that the average non-jerk is not going to attempt to divide a group of people if they do not have to. That said, when I would walk in a horizontal line with Heleina and her aunt, people feel free to slip between Heleina and I but not she and her aunt. Since people seem to assume that I am not with Heleina, I wonder if they think that it is odd that I walk so close to her – “Perv!”

Anyway, my wife and I have always been aware of the differences intrinsic to an interracial marriage, yet living in Los Angeles, and especially Boston, we rarely felt singled out for our choice. In Yuen Long, we are clearly in deviation from expectations and the average person on the street seems comfortable expressing their surprise via stares. And don’t even get me started on when we hold hands.