How I, a Chinese-Portuguese, connected with my peers across the world
The lack of representation, voices, and discourses to counter xenophobic and racist remarks in the country where I was born led to immense self-questioning whilst growing up. It was hard to watch my parents, who were not fluent in the foreign language, unable to defend themselves. Throughout my early school days, my sister and I would be the only Asian kids. The small town we grew up in is located just a bridge away from the capital of Portugal, Lisbon. Many articles I’ve read about the struggles of Chinese immigrants and topics related to inner conflicts regarding one’s identity were found online, written by members of the Asian diaspora from the other side of the ocean. They helped me understand and become more aware of prejudices against Chinese people — how similar our experiences were!
As I read more about the Chinese community in the US, however, I encountered a lot of different aspects too. I used to be amazed knowing that many Chinese immigrants in the US had white-collar jobs. I remember vividly wishing that my parents were teachers or had some other professional job, so they could help me with my homework, or be able to take time off to spend time with me and my siblings. Most of the Chinese immigrants (those from Zhejiang) in Southern Europe have low levels of education due to their rural background.
Visiting the US was eye-opening. When I visited San Francisco’s Chinatown, seeing so many elders hanging out together made me feel like I was in my family’s hometown in China. And when we went to a Chinese restaurant, I was surprised when I heard Cantonese among the waiters, a foreign language that I never encountered back home. At that moment, I realised how Chinese immigration from China to Portugal and Southern Europe, in general, was so new compared to the US. Their older immigration experience and the racial discourse in the US helped me understand my situation as a daughter of Chinese immigrants, giving me the motivation to write and reflect on the immigrants’ experiences in Portugal — why is there so much prejudice? What is wrong with being Chinese? How should we react when people make hurtful comments even though they claim they didn’t mean to? Racial microaggressions were common growing up and since young, I had to learn not to take it seriously. Some kids at school would make fun of my eyes. People get surprised when I speak perfect Portuguese and ask me how I mastered their language, sometimes even after I tell them that I was born and raised here. Or sometimes people automatically erase my Chinese identity after knowing that I have a Portuguese passport. It’s like I have to choose a side — especially whenever China is mentioned during class. For instance, during middle school, one of my teachers told us that if someone goes to China, they’ll see dead babies everywhere. When I heard such a comment, I froze. I couldn’t say anything, but on my mind, so many thoughts went through my head. How come that I, who travelled frequently to China, never saw such a thing, while my teacher probably never stepped into the country? Or when other students assume that I solely get good grades because I’m Asian, not considering my hard work? Reading about experiences written by Asian Americans made me feel understood and even gave me the courage to feel proud about our culture, as articles about such topics written in the first person didn’t exist where I come from.
Even though I could relate to others many times (the experience of being children of Asian immigrants in the West seemed to be universal), my reality had its characteristics and was specific to the small community I knew. My parents and their friends do similar work for a living — they’re either self-employed, owning restaurants, stores, import-export businesses, or wholesale, or work for other Chinese immigrants in the same industries. It’s a small, tight community that goes beyond borders, with many old friends having reconnected, after years of having losing contact, through WeChat.
In fact, whenever I travel to another European country, my parents insist that I stay with their friends. And on some of those trips, I met many of them and got to know their stories. Last summer when I planned to travel to Greece, my father promptly contacted his former classmate who was living there. Even though she wasn’t living in Athens, she and her husband picked us from the airport. My sister and I travelled to her city, Nafplio, a lovely seaport town, for the weekend. During our stay, she told us her story of migration: first, it was her husband who left China. Before having established their own business, he would sell beach umbrellas, walking several kilometres along the coast every day to make a living, his misaligned shoulders proof of his early hardship. After he got enough money and opened retail stores, he brought his wife and their children to Greece.
Moreover, back in 2015 when I travelled to Italy with my mom, apart from attending a relative’s wedding, we also visited my mom’s former classmate in Milan, as they had reconnected through WeChat after years of losing contact with each other. There, apart from finding Chinese restaurants and shops, I also saw many bars and coffee shops run by Chinese immigrants. My mother’s friend herself had a coffee shop and welcomed me with a cappuccino. In Portugal, coffee shops are usually run by Portuguese people and I was amazed at how she interacted with local Italians, engaging in casual conversation, serving traditional Italian drinks and pastries. Like my mother, she left China looking for a better quality of life, as they are both from a small village located at the top of a mountain.
Therefore, when I was little, I thought that the Chinese immigrants in other countries went through a similar experience. Indeed, my knowledge was largely limited as my parents and their friends all come from a similar background. As they are all from the same city, they also share the same dialect (Qingtian), which they use to communicate with each other rather than using Mandarin Chinese. Academic research confirms what I experienced: the fact that the Chinese community in Southern Europe is heavily shaped by relationships, especially among those from the same city.
As I started using the Internet and especially since having joined the group Subtle Asian Traits on Facebook, I felt that there was finally a safe space in which members of the Asian diaspora could express a side of their identities which is often suppressed in order to fit in. I often found comfort as we all can relate to each other in some way. However, on the other side, I also got to learn about different historical experiences of Chinese immigrants. Indeed, I wasn’t aware of the heterogeneity that exists within the Chinese diaspora, especially in the US. By doing some research, I found that immigration to the US started after the 1840s and that Chinese Americans are constituted by many different groups — those from mainland China, Taiwan, Southeast Asia, and descendants of old immigrants (Song, 2019). The relaxation of immigration policies after WWII diversified the Chinese immigrants and their socioeconomic status also improved (Song, 2019). Consequently, expectations towards the second and later generations got higher: I often read how the only acceptable careers for most Asian parents are either law, medicine, or engineering, which was something quite unfamiliar to me. For instance, many children of my parents’ friends chose to work on the family business, or they chose to create their own in the same sectors with their parents’ support and knowledge. There is an emphasis on education, but if the children of immigrants joined their parents later in the host country, they may feel a lot of difficulties to learn the language and adapt to a completely new cultural environment, distancing themselves from the education path.
Nevertheless, at the same time, I’ve seen a trend to invest in their children’s education. Usually, those who were born in the host country, or if the family has financial means, are expected to pursue higher education in order to get a ‘better’ job, as being an entrepreneur is hard work, often with no time for holidays, which is something that I’ve experienced first-hand. Instead of having family trips like my friends at school, I’d help at my parents’ businesses during the weekends and holidays when I got old enough to do so. Therefore, many parents are working hard to finance their children’s higher education, including mine, and I can’t feel grateful enough for all the sacrifices they’ve made so far.
Furthermore, I also noticed how some Asian Americans were ‘distanced’ from Chinese culture — not speaking their parents’ mother tongue at home, hiding parts of their Asian identity, proudly announcing not wanting to date someone with the same ethnicity, due to the various harmful stereotypes that lead to an inner conflict, one that I am familiar with. Indeed, growing up in a predominantly white society may cause us to distance ourselves from our culture. However, at home, my parents firmly educated us with traditional Chinese values. It often led to conflicts at home due to the divergent views, but now that I’m older, I understand why they insisted so much. Throughout time, our cultural identity and its values may become diluted, as a way to find acceptance in the mainstream society. Perhaps because the immigration in Europe is more recent, the younger generation seems to be more connected to their roots compared to many Chinese Americans of the same age group. My parents and their friends often talk about the importance of preserving traditional values on the younger generation who can be simultaneously on both sides.
The topic of Chinese diaspora is fascinating and there are many other aspects of the Chinese diaspora that I haven’t covered here; what I’ve written is what I’ve seen and experienced. Its heterogeneity needs yet to be further researched. On a political level, the rise of China in the international system is, without a doubt, influencing the Chinese diaspora in the West, which increasingly views China as a threat. How we see ourselves has become more important than ever, and through shared experiences, we can support each other finding our place in countries we proudly call our own. Identity is not static, and I believe it can be inclusive of many different parts of ourselves, celebrating the diversity within our communities. We owe it to the pioneers of our families who chose to be brave enough to leave everything behind in search of a better life elsewhere.
