Seriously, if you never knew me before then a friend of yours introduced you to me, where do you think I am from? What do you think my nationality is? Here's a picture to help.
I thought I look 100% Indonesian, but even Indonesians ask me that. There had been times where I was introduced to new people and they directly asked this. Especially if the people talk to each other in English, blame it for being a 2nd language over here and blame them for mistaking my fluent-ness ( is there such word? ) for not being a local.
This doesn't only happen in my country. Apparently I can pull of saying I'm from any parts of South East Asia.
All my life, I have been mistaken for being a Thai ( which isn't entirely wrong, due to my mom ), Malaysian, Singaporean, Filipina, Cambodian, Viet...Some even went overboard by guessing I must be Chinese or Japanese. Hello, darker skin, bigger eyes, not pointy noses, classic South East Asian look? I wish I had one of those East Asian beautifully fair skin. I wish.
I'm not blaming anyone though, I wont call anyone racist for not being able to tell the difference between South East Asians but I'll probably just give them long lectures. I may not look Indonesian enough due to my pointy cornered cat eyes or unusually shaped face but now I'm used to it. I'm not mad about it and try to embrace it. Besides, it gives me tons of advantages in any of these countries. They don't charge me more in Bangkok like they do with other tourists ( I may not be able to speak Thai at all but I know how to shop talk locally ). They don't give me 'oh, she's a tourist' look when I chill in KL, but well Indonesians and Malaysians look freakishly similar anyway until I open my mouth to talk and not having one of those Malay accents. Will Amy and Ejannz please stand up and school me on this?
And when I was in Singapore, I found even my friends talk Singlish to me. Example : Ah, shaddup lah. you say you wan' to treat me go lunch. You all fart and no shit only.
I love it.
Do you look the way people where you're from supposed to look? Do you see it as an advantage / disadvantage?
This doesn't only happen in my country. Apparently I can pull of saying I'm from any parts of South East Asia.
All my life, I have been mistaken for being a Thai ( which isn't entirely wrong, due to my mom ), Malaysian, Singaporean, Filipina, Cambodian, Viet...Some even went overboard by guessing I must be Chinese or Japanese. Hello, darker skin, bigger eyes, not pointy noses, classic South East Asian look? I wish I had one of those East Asian beautifully fair skin. I wish.
I'm not blaming anyone though, I wont call anyone racist for not being able to tell the difference between South East Asians but I'll probably just give them long lectures. I may not look Indonesian enough due to my pointy cornered cat eyes or unusually shaped face but now I'm used to it. I'm not mad about it and try to embrace it. Besides, it gives me tons of advantages in any of these countries. They don't charge me more in Bangkok like they do with other tourists ( I may not be able to speak Thai at all but I know how to shop talk locally ). They don't give me 'oh, she's a tourist' look when I chill in KL, but well Indonesians and Malaysians look freakishly similar anyway until I open my mouth to talk and not having one of those Malay accents. Will Amy and Ejannz please stand up and school me on this?
And when I was in Singapore, I found even my friends talk Singlish to me. Example : Ah, shaddup lah. you say you wan' to treat me go lunch. You all fart and no shit only.
I love it.
Do you look the way people where you're from supposed to look? Do you see it as an advantage / disadvantage?
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You look Indonesian. A beautiful one at that! :) although I can see how you'd pass for a viet as well
I don't look Indonesian but I've been told that the way I carry myself is very Indonesian. Most of the time, people mistake me as Korean or Japanese. It's neither an advantage nor a disadvantage but I like to identify myself as being Indonesian :)
and the word is 'fluency'