The Organic White Banana

"Banana girl" is what some ex-colleagues decided to nickname me when I took up a summer job in Hong Kong three years ago.
Definition: yellow on the outside, white on the inside.
Meaning: Oriental-looking, westernized thinking.

First of all, the only "culture" with yellow skin lives under the works of Matt Groening.

As if equating me to America's favorite fruit was a compliment, those ex-colleagues of mine went on with their creativity and renamed me "White banana".
Explanation: I have indescribably fair skin. Hence, white on the outside, white on the inside.

And it's the same fair skin, plus the small eyes, plus the height, plus the big build, that raises presumptions that I'm Shanghainese, or at least have ancestors from somewhere in Northern China.

Then again, for pretty much the same attributes, I've had Japanese people mistaken me for Japanese. A few times in Japanese restaurants when using my very limited spoken Japanese to thank the waitress for pouring tea for me. Though I'd love to believe that it was my accent-free "arigatou" that threw them. And one time in a Japanese supermarket in Hong Kong, the guy tried to sell me sashimi, in Japanese. Put aside, for a second, the fact that I was "just looking". I backed away while telling him I'm not Japanese in broken Japanese, bowing and all.

If identity crises were fatal, I would've probably died of all the complications long ago.

Having spent half my life in Hong Kong and half in Canada, I often find myself pausing and pondering at the question of my identity. The question "where are you from" works mystery for me. If I were situated in Toronto, my answer would be "Hong Kong". But if I were in Hong Kong, my answer would be "Canada". Though, if I were elsewhere in Asia, I'd say I'm from Hong Kong, and if I weren't in Toronto but anywhere in North America, I'd say I'm from Toronto.

Thank God I haven't had a chance to visit Europe just yet.

And that's not all. I've been told repeatedly that I'm not able to express myself properly in words.

And I'm a writer, yes.

Well, let's just say if, one day, English and Chinese are merged to form a new dialect, I'd be everyone's language therapist. To this day, I only know of one person who speaks the same tongue as me. (C, we're two of a kind.)