Let's play ''Where's Alan?''

There's a running joke between my two american collegues and I. We agree that they're always playing 'Where's Alan (originally Wally)' whenever we're together and I walk away from them in a crowd. And it's no joke either, because i'll sometimes walk ahead or lag behind when we're out and about, and the next thing I know they're staring right past me trying to find me. Several times I've walked past them on campus and they've literally brushed right by without recognizing me. Since most local Chinese are fond of calling out 'hello, hello' whenever they see a white person (in a mocking tone i might add), I have to resort to something else so my friends can realize it's me. 'oi dickhead!' then they turn their heads. Sometimes I use my obscurity to my advantage though. I'm not exactly keen to talk to all of the other foreign teachers (because some just downright creep me out or make me wanna shoot myself), so if i see them approaching from the other direction I just have to tuck in close to the group of chinese students in front of me and lower my head. It works, every time.

I can understand why they don't notice me walk right by on campus. Since there are only about 7 white faces on campus, they get a hell of a lot of attention from everyone. Making eye contact with students might actually encourage some of the students to approach you. It's usually the ones that have only been around foreigners a few times in their lives, because you can sense the palpable excitement in the air when they come up to you. If it's a student whose english skills are pretty poor, it can be the most strangest and disjointed of encounters. Then you get those ones that will straight up throw themselves at you and request you be their English master (tutor) so they can prepare for their upcoming english exam. Much akin to those old kung fu si- fus! All i can say is thank god i'm not white.

Actually I also never look at the faces of passing students when walking around campus. I have about 300+ students in all my classes and meet so many more students every day outside of class, that i have a hard time remembering faces or names. Especially chinese names for that matter, because they're that much harder to distinguish, and it's like having to remember two or three names per one person since they have 2-3 characters. But coming back to facial recognition, I admit that i still suck at distinguishing chinese faces. and yes, I know I'm Chinese. Must be all those years of looking at caucasian faces in Australia. I said this in a previous blog from last trip, and I still maintain that there is much less variety in Chinese facial features compared to caucasians.
http://alinchina08.blogspot.com/2009/01/13-billion-is-big-number.html
Unless you have some massive birthmark or giant mole, slapped across you're face, I'm sorry, I will not recognize you if you have that generic Chinese chop.

And something else I'll add is that Chinese people tend to follow the exact same fashion trends. Many of them sport the same haircuts, and have similar tastes in clothes and even glasses frames. I swear to you, there are two girls in one of my classes that can pass as identical twins- same looking face, same type of frames, same haircut. I don't know what causes this trend, the fact that chinese society doesn't mind plagiarism, or the fact that it's a much stronger collective/group society, and that nobody wants to stand out from the group.

But the local chinese themselves have no problems distinguishing two chinese faces. I mean, they can recognize me in a second, but thats probably not a good indicator since not many other guys sport facial hair or use hair gel here. So obviously it's got something to do with practice and exposure. My american friends and I joke that after a year here in China we'll be pros picking out chinese faces in a crowd, but we won't be able to distinguish a red head from a blonde when we get back to the west. ha ha.