Learning Through a Bowl
- By: brandon ogbolu
- Created on: 05/17/2008
- Rated By 1 Users
- Comments: none
I have empathy for goldfish. During the beginning of my stay in China this past
summer, I suffered from the ‘fishbowl complex.’ From the streets of Beijing to the
tourist attractions in Xi’an, I was stared at, videotaped, and photographed.
Most vividly, I remember visiting the world famous Tiananmen Square. As I
walked the square, people’s eyes drew toward me. My presence broke the security
guards’ firm stature surrounding Beijing’s national flag. They too began watching with
investigating eyes. Almost immediately after, a family asked if I could hold their six
month old baby for a photograph with me. After awkwardly accepting the baby, the
family began laughing and pulled out their tourist camera, initially meant for the sites at
Tiananmen Square, and captured me: I became their site of interest. Being in this
‘fishbowl’ entailed a feeling of entrapment and insecurity because I felt everyone’s
stares, no matter where or what I did; a feeling of paranoia consumed me.
Growing up African American in America, I thought I would be prepared and
somewhat adjusted for a new role as a minority amongst 1.4 billion Chinese people. To some extent, I thought life in China would mirror the life of a person of color in
America, since I assumed both must deal with discrimination. I thought that being a
black male would enable me to cope with such prejudices, since I live with an
unconscious mindset that the minority is often stereotyped. But I was wrong.
I was not ready for the pictures and videos taken of me as I ate at restaurants, nor
the perpetual staring and pointing. Questions like, “Are you an NBA player?” and “Can
you rap?” angered me. I hated the requests to take pictures with me the most because I thought I was being mocked. I became annoyed, frustrated, and uncomfortable since I
did not travel to China to be their tourist attraction, and I was determined to enjoy my
trip. To obviate this, when people asked if they could take photos with me, I began
rejecting their request by saying, “No.” When I saw people who stared, I stared back. I
made it my duty to avoid the public requests and to stay out of that ‘fishbowl.’
But why was I doing this? Was it really worth the time and energy to stay out of
this temporary spotlight? But as I thought, my heart sank low. At this moment, after
finding unsatisfying answers, I realized that there was something I felt uneasy about. I
thought back to the civil rights movement when African Americans were struggling and
hoping for an opportunity to assert their voices politically and socially. I remembered
that back then, and even now, many minorities suffer from an invisibility that is so
damaging because it doesn’t allow for whites to ever really know blacks. How awful and selfish it is that, here I am in a country with curious people, and I continually reject their ability to see me and understand me for who I truly am. I was creating a different kind of invisibility. From that point on, I became positive and embraced questions and photographs. Perhaps some were curious the way humans are when confronted with the novelty of a foreigner, but I also realized that the Chinese wanted to know me. I was foreign and interesting, and they wanted an authentic connection with me. By answering racial questions that originally sounded absurd, I was able to break some stereotypes and show them that not all African Americans were the same. Going to China enabled me to see and experience a foreign Chinese culture from a different and more authentic perspective than my Chinese language classes offered. Conversely, my being there enabled the Chinese to have real encounters with an African American. My insecurities and annoyances should not have come in the way of learning. As I reflect on my experiences in China, I came to understand that learning need not always come by enveloped in comfort, security, and without tension. Sometimes personal sacrifices must be made. While I don’t relish being in that ‘fishbowl,’ I do see now that I wouldn’t have the renewed sense of self that I left China with.
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