Thanks for the write-up! It’s extremely interesting to learn about the nuances in the situation. I definitely understand how it’s frustrating to be put in a box, even if it initially comes with advantages. It also definitely sounds like the disadvantages won out after a while too. Minorities often get the short end of the stick everywhere, it seems.

Also, on my personal side of things, I also understand what you mean by Chinese Americans being Americans. I do consider myself Canadian first and foremost. It’s what I’m most familiar and comfortable with. It’s home. Most of my friends are Canadian, and I’m used ti interacting with people using Canadian or Chinese-Canadian cultural norms. It’s just that I’m also familiar and comfortable with several aspects of Chinese culture because it’s rooted in many aspects of Chinese Canadian culture, or because I’ve heard about a lot of other Chinese cultural norms and the context behind them from people I’ve met, even if I haven’t experienced it firsthand. However, I fully expect that I would learn a lot about Chinese culture from someone who’s lived in China long-term.

I’ll also say that, from merely visiting China a few times, I definitely felt culture shock from being exposed to the parts of the culture I was unfamiliar or uncomfortable with. In addition, even though that I’d felt completely comfortable with some aspects of Chinese culture while I was home in Canada, I felt quite stressed out about having to fulfill these norms full time. However, I think I was probably more at ease with aspects of cantonese culture than most white Americans/Canadians typically would be. Norms such as calling strangers by a familial address or the extremely informal way some people address waiters at informal cantonese restaurants seem completely normal to me. The “strange” foods at many such restaurants or strange ingredients in traditional chinese medicine, I have views that vary from it’s completely normal, but I’m a vegetarian for typical western (white) girl reasons not Chinese ones, so yes I do consider oysters meat but aren’t you glad I’m aware that tofu isn’t usually a meat replacement to as unobjectionable as most meats go but lbr snake soup has always drawn as many customers interested for reasons of gimmick as for taste to absolutely not, for several reasons. I think these views align more with mainstream Chinese culture on some points and mainstream Canadian culture on others —and mostly, but not always, with mainstream Chinese Canadian culture.