The smell of alcohol, sweat and weed permeated the room. I leaned my back against the slimy wall, attempting to have a doze, only to be startled by the disco ball strobe lights flashing right in front of my eyes. As usual, my friends were getting shitfaced and grinding to the blaring music. I lugged myself past crowds of half-naked college kids bobbing up and down. Albeit buzzed, I filled my red solo cup with chasers and another shot of vodka.
The things that happened the rest of the night have slipped my mind, but when I opened my eyes the next morning, I was terrified.
I woke up and found myself surrounded by pale white walls and the pungent smell of antiseptics. I was lying on a hospital bed. My fingers were clamped by pulse oximeters and my chest was connected to a cardiac monitor that generated a steady beep. Half an hour later, I was picked up by a girl Stephanie (a pseudonym), one of the few friends I had made in college so far.
Having graduated from an international high school in Beijing, Stephanie is the type of girl whose polished American accent and extroverted character helped her quickly overcome any cultural shock. Less than one month into freshman year, Stephanie had established herself as the go-to buddy for edibles, frat party invitations and even math tutoring, just to name a few. I always looked up to her, eager to prove my capability of making friends with people from diverse cultures and juggling academics with social life.
My longing for social recognition was not only driven by a desire to better adapt to the new environment, but also by a disdain for my past self.
Compared to Stephanie, I was living an almost ascetic life throughout my three years in the best-known public high school in Shenzhen.
Each morning, I would wake up before 6:30 and walk to the lecture hall with some of my seven roommates — who bunked together in a 10-by-12 dormitory with me — to attend our “Honor English” course. Fancy as the name sounds, the class mainly consisted of dull monologues given by our English teacher who fully understood the futility of encouraging his students to speak: Chinese students can easily get a 1500+ on the SAT, but they can hardly express their opinions when interacting with native speakers because of their inherent diffidence and the lack of English proficiency.
The first point is nothing more than a stereotype that portrays Chinese or international students in general as inferior groups of people. But the latter point does make some sense since many of us — those who couldn’t afford the exorbitant tuition fees to attend a private international high school — went through an education system that discouraged students from practicing communication skills and, by extension, social skills. For subjects like history and politics, we were passively absorbing propaganda-infused knowledge. Remember the standard answers and you will nail your exams. Even after attending high school, where Advanced Placement (AP) courses taught by professors from the U.S. were offered, we found ourselves in another quandary. Our previous English education almost exclusively focused on memorizing grammatical features and fancy words that we were simply unable to speak without stuttering.
At the same time, I wanted to smash those stereotypes about Chinese students studying abroad in the U.S. The notion that being an international student from China implies wearing super thick glasses, pulling all-nighters to do some programming, and staying reticent in conversations was more than a blanket statement. I felt humiliated and inferior. It seemed that in America, our culture and our people are merely streamlined products.
I wanted to be someone different.
Northwestern provided me with a ton of opportunities to distinguish myself from the “typical” Chinese students. Pursuing a double major in Journalism and Middle East and North African Studies, I was always the only Chinese student sitting amid a bunch of white kids jabbering about gubernatorial elections, American interventions in the Middle East, and other topics I had never heard of. Was I really interested in these subjects? Debatable. Staying up until 3 a.m. in the library was definitely a pain in the ass, but I enjoyed the pride I felt whenever people asked me, “What classes are you taking this quarter?”
I blurted out, “Environment and Energy in the Middle East, Islamic Law, Reporting and Writing. These are very interesting classes. Strongly recommended.”
Usually, people would react with a mixture of confusion and astonishment, followed by compliments on my courage to explore a variety of disciplines. I would shrug off the admiration and explain to them that I completed my work well ahead of the deadline because “I have to go to quite a few parties on the weekend” (If you know how boring Greek life at Northwestern is, you should understand it’s a lie). It would still give me the rush of exhilaration if I dress up, trek through the campus to the fraternity quad, take group selfies with my American friends who dress up as cute cheerleaders, post on my Instagram and receive hundreds of likes.
I befriended cool kids who used Juuls to get high during class and made love at the Lakefill. Despite their occasional throwaway remarks that were offensive to other cultures including mine, I convinced myself that as long as I managed to tolerate their racial bias and maintain friendships with American (or white) students, I would be qualified to enter the elite clique in college.
Peer pressure also made me start experimenting with my own body. I pierced my ear, got a tattoo on my thigh, made out with strangers. America, the so-called land of freedom and equality, emerged as a place of liberation where I was able to try unusual, and even bizarre, things without my parents yelling at me.
It took me two months to figure out I was not happy. Even though I did my best to socialize with the executive board members of the student clubs that I wanted to join, including International Student Organization and three dance crews, I was rejected by almost every single one of them. I got drugged at a house party and was transported by ambulance to a hospital, which left me with an $800 medical bill that I struggled to pay off. I overheard other Chinese students bad-mouthing me because I am friends with a lot of white people, even though I stopped hanging out with many of them after I found out our interests rarely overlapped.
My identity got stuck in between as if I was standing in the middle of a single-planked bridge, and either end was too far to reach.
After cancelling my appointment with Counseling and Psychological Services (CAPS), a service the University offers to all students seeking help for mental health problems, I packed my suitcase and hopped on the CTA outbound train toward O’Hare International Airport. Fall Quarter freshman year. Done. I watched the familiar scenery flashing past the windows.
My failures. Gone.
My parents took me to my favorite restaurant. They ordered all the dishes I liked, but neither of them picked up chopsticks until I took a huge bite of my food and mumbled, “zhen hao chi (tastes so good).” Out of my surprise, they didn’t ask about my study, which made me disappointed because after sleeping for less than three hours each day throughout the final week, I got a 4.0 GPA to brag about. Instead, they noticed my rapid weight loss. I was 5 feet 10 inches tall at that time, but my weight had plummeted to only slightly above 120 pounds — “thin to the point of emaciation” — according to their description.
While I was able to stay in Shenzhen for only 20 days during winter break, the short reunion with my family and culture had a significant healing effect on my mental condition. I had the opportunity to devour a table of Canton Din Sum, visit my friends and teachers back in high school, and most importantly, reconnect to my cultural roots. Had I never set foot in the U.S. and lived as a stranger to the new environment, I wouldn’t understand the convenience of WeChat online payment system, the cordiality of eating out of communal plates, and the vibrant Chinese culture.
I came to realize that to a great extent, my previous unrealistic expectations about American culture blindfolded me, so I chose to ignore all the positive aspects of my own culture and even developed resentments about my identity. And yet, the image of being a social butterfly did not necessarily help eradicate the stereotypes about Chinese students.
Instead, it perpetuated the impression that students were straying from their Chinese roots because of its inherent inferiority. As for my decision to enroll in classes that almost no other international students would take, it was nothing but a pursuit of vanity. The brutal reality was that since I was constantly stressed out by the heavy workload, I gradually lost my interest in these subjects and became known as someone who acted on impulse and was unable to take care of myself. Far from reshaping the common (mis)understanding of Chinese students, I felt like a shame to the community.
Looking back, I am embarrassed by the stupid things I did in my first quarter in college, but also grateful for the lessons I learned from this melodrama. I started to reconcile with my identity and appreciate the positive values promoted by my Chinese culture. It’s not to say that I have since returned to my comfort zone and lived in the cultural bubble, but I am finally at ease with making friends with people of varying backgrounds. I developed friendships with many Chinese students that I had been reluctant to interact with, and I also reached compromise with those who had been shunning me because they believed I behaved like a whitewashed person. I’ve become one of the closest friends with Stephanie, who later confided in me that she also had huge problems with social life and mental health, and realized that those so-called social butterflies could also experience unhappiness and loneliness.
I no longer seek to sever the ties with the culture that not only posits me in a community but also allows me to be an individual. Being different has no appeal to me anymore, even if it means conforming to another norm.
To get in contact with Adrian, send him an email over at adrianwanlm@gmail.com.
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