I think it has to do with comfort. Sometimes its easier to just be with people who have had similar experiences with you growing up. You don't have to explain everything or worry about things sounding weird.


That being said, I'm south asian and was born and raised in Canada. If I look at my group of friends at mac I can't really find one race that is more dominant than others and I loooove it.

Originally Posted by moops

I think it has to do with comfort. Sometimes its easier to just be with people who have had similar experiences with you growing up. You don't have to explain everything or worry about things sounding weird.

Good stuff. I forgot to add that on there.

Originally Posted by moops

That being said, I'm south asian and was born and raised in Canada. If I look at my group of friends at mac I can't really find one race that is more dominant than others and I loooove it.

Coming from Markham, that's surprising....

My high school was like, 49% Chinese :S

My highschool was like that too! And the other half was south asian.
But since I was really young I did a lot of things in the community so my friends from Markham are about as diverse as my friends from Mac are.

Originally Posted by _Luu_

Even saying this, I even got told by a bunch of Asian girls that I was "too white" for them, because I grew up in Canada and therefore unlike other Asian dudes. Pffft, whatever that means. *Rolls eyes*

Yikes. Yeah, people call me white-washed all the time and while I don't take too much offense to it, I still find it strange that someone wouldn't want to hang out with someone else based on how they act - according to unwritten rules about how ethnicities should act. Do you know how ridiculous that sounds? Haha.

I understand that culture is important and we should probably remember where we come from, but at the same time, race doesn't even exist biologically - it's completely socially constructed. No one seems to get that though. I just hope that it'll get better with future generations.

lol thanks Andrew, I Always wondered why those Asians always hung out together and never spoke a word of English or how they seemed so extremely shy and uneasy when in a muticultural group presentation thing and very at ease with their own friends. Like even at my FYEO counselling sessions the asians look exceptionally shy and somewhat scared!

But for some reason the whole homesickness/cultural thing is faced by all immigrants, yet the Far Asians seemingly take it worse then the other minorities for some reason :S Maybe its just that the culture they had back home is EXACTLY the culture followed by east asians here?(the anime, dressing up, consumer spending, food etc)? Like the other minorities like the SouthAsians(As I have written below) are actually following their own culture identity crisis thing re-invention here then how they were back home :S

But what's wierder is that I don't hang out with brown people at all! Even though I lived 18 years in Karachi I feel actually alienated by the local south asian culture! The whole gangster dress up/ talk style and this wierd tougher then they are subculture was actually nothing like what people back home were. Infact If any of these brown kids were to come to Pakistan to my highschool they would have been slaughtered for being "burgers"(its a slang that sort of means someone who follows far too much western culture).

Hence I'm actually much more at ease with the non-brown people who don't act "gangster" or whatever they do in the identity crisis they suffer here. Maybe its an escape from the whole "brown people"= nerds and computer geeks thing that they are escaping by dressing up in jersies and fitted hats and big shoes?

I really don't find much segregation here at Mac. As mentioned, from time to time, I would see a few groups here and there.
It might be because at my high school I had all kinds of friends, from different backgrounds. My group of friends is very diverse and I always find myself hanging out with a different group every time.
I feel like I am able to fit in with any group here at Mac. Heck, when we play soccer, there is a group of Asians that always play together and speak using their own dialects. However, I still join them and play with them.
I like getting to know people from different backgrounds, so I can learn new things from them. I find it that as long as you make the effort to talk to these groups, the bubble will be broken. I made lots of friends like that and I try to introduce them to people from different backgrounds.
If you know me very well, you will notice that there isn't a particular group of people that I hang out with. Among friends, I am actually known as the multicultural guy because you could find me with a different group everyday haha. I don't hang out much with people from the same background as me much at all. I find it more interesting meeting different people with different experiences. My ex girlfriends have never been from the same background as me either.
Anyway, I honestly think as long as we approach these groups, it shouldn't be a problem. As mentioned, it's mainly due to the fact that they're not comfortable going out there and meeting new people. McMaster is actually very diverse which is why I love the university and its students.

I personally don't see this clique thing happening ONLY with Asians. There is a large Chinese and Korean population at Mac, and that's probably why you always come across this. But I find that Caucasians and other non-Asians do likewise...just not as obvious with the 'speaking their own language' thing. A lot of Caucasians (i.e. the Canadians) can only speak English so when they're chatting with their own little "groupie", they're not considered to be rude or anything because they're speaking English.

But I get what you guys mean. I know even within the Chinese population, there's further separation between the "immigrants" and the "CBCs" (Canadian-born Chinese) -- that's actually how my Saturday Chinese classes were split up (and I have no idea how else to describe this). I was always considered to be a "CBC" even though I was born in Hong Kong, but I started kindergarten here. So to some of my "immigrant" friends, I'm pretty white-washed. This, I think...is something that happens within all ethnicity groups, too...just not as obvious?

But yeah, we do see ethnic cliques here and there, but like nino said, it doesn't mean they're unapproachable. Some people are just so used to speaking their own language every day, especially those who are forced to speak it at home because their grandparents and/or parents don't understand English at all. It's just a (bad) habit, I suppose.

I know some people who purposely speak their own language when they want to say something they don't want others to understand. I, too, would find it annoying when you're working on a project and two of your group members always talk in their own language. That's just rude. But I do think that most of the time, it's unintentional and that it's got to do with the whole comfort thing and being able to communicate more easily. Also, for some people, they would never have to feel embarrassed due to poor English communication skills, have to repeat things or even ask others to repeat and/or slow down. It's just human nature to look for the easy way out.

I would join an ethnic club but I think I'd be stoned.

See, I'm Indian but I can barely speak Hindi.

My Hindi makes people laugh.
It's very very sad.

You're not that bad goodnews.inc. I'm indian who can't even attempt to speak Hindi and am half chinese-jamacian. My cousins laugh at me all the time. Now, let's imagine actual people that don't know me. :S

EDIT: I'd like to say also that I speak some Canto. Now Indian-looking person that speaks Cantonese?

Originally Posted by mellye

You're not that bad goodnews.inc. I'm indian who can't even attempt to speak Hindi and am half chinese-jamacian. My cousins laugh at me all the time. Now, let's imagine actual people that don't know me. :S

EDIT: I'd like to say also that I speak some Canto. Now Indian-looking person that speaks Cantonese?

Haha, my doctor is Chinese-Jamaican. When I first met him, I had to keep asking him what he said because his Jamaican accent was so strong. It shocked the hell out of me, but it's fun to talk to him.

haha. my mommy has an accent. i'm used to it now. but all my friends never have any idea what she's saying... EVER. Sometimes, I don't get it when she goes all out. aha.

I generally don't have a problem with people being 'proud' of their culture, religious background or anything like that...

But Reverse-discrimination has got to be one of my pet peeves...even more than standard discrimination (not that it's 'worse' but just that people generally seem to let it slide!). I know better than to hate an entire race based on what a few people have said...but I know of a few asian guys who used to basically talk down to me like dirt if I was ever associating with them...ie. collaborating on an assignment.

Once, to demonstrate just how dumb this attitude is, I was working on a math assignment with a few people, one of whom is chinese and basically thinks I'm a big buffoon (I'm all but convinced it's because I'm white). I collaborated well with everyone else, and I gave a suggestion that eventually lead to the solution of a problem. In his pride, he refused to take my idea and finish the problem...unfortunate ly, he couldn't think of another way to do it before the deadline, and so he chose hand in nothing for that question, instead of listening to a white guy. (He seemed to have no problem with the 2 indian guys I was also working with, even though they happened to pitch fewer ideas that day) But his stubbornness is how I know it isn't about thinking I don't know what I'm doing...I got a solution and he just didn't want to use my idea S:

I definitely don't have a problem with asians...my long-time girlfriend is asian! But for some reason, whenever I meet any asians and I'm with her, the first thing they ask is what kind of asian she is...it's like everything is about race. Furthermore, whenever I meet some of her distant family (like cousins) I feel like they're judging me, and/or disappointed that I'm not asian.Paranoia perhaps?

Maybe I'm old fashioned, but I like to pride myself on what I CAN control...I solved some math problem and helped out my classmates? Sure. I won the superbowl? Great. "Lookit me, I'm (whatever race)!" or "I'm (not) gay! Acknowledge me!"...in a perfect world, I wouldn't care about those things, I try my best not to care about those issues, so why confront me with them?

I completely agree with you, Mowicz! Because I'm chinese and indian, I get that people think that I'm some sort of super machine of math. But unfortunately, despite cultural jokes being kind of fun and sometimes really true, people act on these stereotypes as the official guide of being a certain culture.

I really like how you put it. Taking pride in what you can control.

Do I get some sort of reward for creating two and a half epic threads even though this one has strayed off way out of topic?