Ever feel like you aren't a real Chinese? when you're around 'real Chinese' people?

For those who were raised in a foreign country outside China. For myself I feel very western in thinking and my chinese is very bad, I can only have a plain conversation in Chinese and write and read basic stuff. So that's why around real Chinese people I feel that I don't belong there and I don't feel a connection. Whenever I'm in HongKong I feel like a foreigner although my parents where born there. It's kind of a paradox here, whenever I'm in the Netherlands I feel like a chinese and whenever i'm in HongKong I feel like a real 'Dutchie'. Has anyone experienced this also?

 

Well, it probably has something to do with your infamiliarity to the town? Getting lost, don't know what to take, don't know the best places in town (not the tourist-y spots)...

It simply takes a year or so's living in Hong Kong to make you a Hong Konger proper... Of course good command on Chinese, be it Mandarin or Cantonese, helps ease the progress...

 

just eat some rice and you'll feel more asian.

 

Although I'm an ABC, I think of myself as 100% Chinese. Surprisingly I can speak better Chinese than one of my friends that was born in China. People can't tell that I can speak perfect Chinese cause of my looks cause i was born here. I don't mind.

 

I don't feel that way when I am around chinese people but I kinda know what you mean. The latest topics in HK won't be as familiar to you. Just need to update on the current trend in HK and you'll be fine.

 

i'm an ABC too lol, but i only feel that way around taiwanese people and people speaking mandarin lol, mandarin speaking people outnumber cantonese people where i live. but canto for life!!! lol

 

yea sometimes i also feel excluded when i with native born chinese. So most of my friends i could say are American born chinese. I just feel more comfortable being in that group

 

Used to feel that way, but once you come more into contact with "real Chinese", you will eventually be comfortable. -^_^

 

if your around proper HK/Chinese people, who are born and are from HK/China and you are chinese and born abroad, they almost all the time see you as a "foreigner"

but it depends how good your chinese is and stuff

 

I feel taht way when i hang out with my HK born friends...i feel out of place because i can't read or write chinese...but i guess my ability to manipulate cantonese allows me to feel somewhat less of an outcast...

 

Well i am an ABC and i tell myself i am chinese but in truth i will never be...... no amount of cheapness and chopstick using will mean anything. i was born in the US and influenced greatly by american culture. that's that

 

I always feel that I am Chinese no matter who I am with.

 

or hold a pair of chopsticks

 

btw, has anyone ever read the book "banana boys" by terry woo? great book by a canadian born chinese. he writes about the conflict a second generation chinese feels growing up in a western world but still having to deal with old traditions of their parents. this is my FAV book. plus, for anyone from toronto, its fun to read him talk about all the places around toronto.
http://www.bananaboys.com/ <--link.

 

Ah..I feel the same way!!! but then in Holland.
Maybe it is because i'm in HK almost every year(2 months out of the 12)....
and I follow the news on HK and China very closely...

 

i knew some chinese people but not friends with them even though i was born in china too. for some reason i just have a lot of difficulty with making chinese friends.

 

I'm in the same situation. I learned a couple of words but yeah its hard to compete. But we are all the same no matter whats your dialect is .

 

i only feel "left out" when my friends start reading things in chinese. like novels, and jokes and other things like that because I cant read or write chinese very well. i usually fool people pretty good though. first they think im pakistani or filipino because im dark as hell, then we talk in chinese and they think i just came from hk/china because its so good, then they are shocked im born canadian and have only been to china once when i was 3.

 

well we all have our own differences there really isnt any REAL chinese considering china is split up so much

 

i do sometimes..
it sucks
and no one helps me speak better haha
then again, im not fully chinese anyways, i just consider myself fully chinese (im 1/4 viet or sumthin like that)
ahh well.. at least i know enough in order to write and speak and everything else..
just not enough to be super fluent >.<