You look like you speak English

Today, I spent my one on one class reviewing a verb form in Chinese that means to seem like, or look like. My teacher gave me lots of examples, using my experiences from Taiwan and Japan as a basis. We covered a lot of interesting topics including how Taiwanese and Japanese people perceive foreigners. She asked me if Japanese people thought I was American when they see me. I told her no, they usually could not tell where I was from because I don't have blond hair or blue eyes. In the past, when I spoke Japanese they could usually tell that I was American because of my pronunciation, but now they can usually tell I lived in Tokyo by the way I speak.

 I told her I once had a Japanese person tell me that they didn't think I was white or black, but they weren't sure what I was. Maybe it's less offensive to say that in Japanese, I'm not really sure. Despite people not thinking I am American, they still expected that I speak English. If you are a foreigner in Japan, people usually think you don't speak Japanese and that you only speak English. This was quite difficult for a lot of friends of mine who couldn't speak English at all, but spoke Japanese fluently. I remember how many stares we would get from Japanese people when we used only Japanese to communicate. It was also frustrating when Japanese people would talk about me on the train assuming I could not understand what they were saying. On more than one occasion, I told them I could perfectly understand what they are saying, and they frequently got embarrassed and apologized.


My teacher then proceed to ask me about my experiences in Taiwan. She said a lot of people probably think I don't speak Chinese or Japanese. I told her about an experience I had on Friday night with my friend who is Japanese and American. If you look at her she probably does not look Japanese, but she was raised in Japan, and speak Japanese fluently. That night we were with two of her other friends, a Japanese girl and a Taiwanese girl, so we all spoke Japanese together. Two Taiwanese guys stopped us and asked us why we were speaking Japanese, or really how could we speak Japanese. My friend explained she was half, and that I had lived in Japan. To them, we just look like foreigners and it amazed them we spoke Japanese.

It is interesting to see how Taiwanese and Japanese people feel about foreigners and their ability to speak a foreign language. I may look on the exterior like a foreigner who only speaks English (whatever that looks like), but then when I speak Japanese or Chinese, people are surprised. I have to say they are less surprised in Taipei, maybe because more and more foreigners speak Chinese, and Taipei is very Western-friendly city, but it makes me wonder what assumptions people make based on our appearance, and why they make those assumptions.

In America, most people assume everyone speaks English fluently, or at least should. How come this isn't the expectation abroad in Asia. Usually, the expectation is that you don't speak the language of the locals. If you any thoughts or experiences, please feel free to share!