During the time I spent in Tonghua, a small city in northeast Jilin Province, the most interesting part of my stay was always the trips into the city center on “shopping expeditions.”
I stayed on the outskirts of the city, so the fun usually began after getting on to the bus that ran past my apartment and headed downtown. Being a rural part of China, the vast majority of locals had not seen foreigners “live” as it were. Initially I was too absent minded to realize that people were staring at me and not someone next to me, or something behind me. When I did cotton on to the fact that I was the object of curiosity, I was left to deal with the situation. It took a while. Eventually, I did what every foreigner who had been in China did. I accepted the stares as a part of life in China.
Tonghua stares are unblinkingly long. I tried staring back, smiling back, pulling faces, and keeping sunglasses on my face permanently. I even tried taking photographs of people who stared at me. Nothing helped. The stares continued. Long looks that drilled into you, probing and scratching--a claustrophobic net of eyes.
There are various categories of stares. You have the top of the range 360 degree stare, where the one staring focuses on you and then does a complete turn, with mouth open optional, to make sure nothing is missed. Then there’s the grab and drag. This one is a coordinated movement where mothers grab their children in the main street and drag them over to see a laowai up close and personal. The shopkeepers’ stare is one of the subtlest, yet extremely effective. Shopkeepers stand 10 centimeters from your face and follow you like a shadow as you go about your shopping. This one is great for no-pressure buying. And of course there is the common or garden variety. The wide-eyed, sudden stare and quick “hello” followed either by a hasty retreat, or alternatively huge peals of laughter. Never quite worked out why the laughter. Perhaps it is an adrenalin rush that comes after doing something daring.
It is a foreign zoo of the most creative kind. I even had women in the supermarket scratch through my shopping trolley to see what kind of food this foreign being consumed. One literally held up each item and showed anyone who would care to look.
I asked a Chinese colleague of mine if Chinese people stare at each other as enthusiastically.
“Of course not she said. It would be rude to do so and they know that.”
The people who stare are those who come from rural areas and have not seen foreigners before, she added.
I’m sorry to burst her bubble, because as any foreign visitors to China will tell you, staring is not restricted to rural areas. It happens in the cities too and is often accompanied by the people doing the staring, talking about you right in your face, and completely disregarding the fact that you just may understand Chinese. You get the feeling that doing anything discretely is impossible. Someone is always watching, evaluating everything about you from your clothes, shoes, hair, to the bag you are carrying and what is in it. Its intrusiveness is heightened because most foreigners are generally taught not to stare from childhood. It therefore takes time to understand, but no matter how you feel about it or what you do about it is going to happen regardless.
I recently found out that medically speaking, the fear of staring is called scopophobia and quite a serious affliction worldwide. It can cause panic attacks and symptoms typically include shortness of breath, rapid breathing sweat and nausea. A word of advice. If you suffer from scopophobia avoid China at all costs!
On the flip side, as a foreigner in China you are often going to be the center of attraction. If you still have an ego, you can have it stroked often, free of charge and live out your own Hollywood fantasy.
On one shopping excursion, I set out to buy a pair of boots and had about 10 sales ladies running around the store trying to find a pair to fit “big foot.” (I wear size 11s, like skis for the folk around here). People even brought their children over to where I was sitting so they could see the size of my feet, while some of the men had to compare their foot size to mine. I am glad the comparisons stopped there! When a pair was eventually found, the by now quite substantial crowd erupted in spontaneous applause. I felt like we had just discovered Atlantis and was obliged to parade up the shop aisle in my newly acquired footwear.
Running the gauntlet of a thousand stares is an intrinsic part of Chinese life for foreigners, whichever way you look at it. Who knows, when you get back home, you might find not being the object of attention a bit deflating. And for all those who continue to stare, I guess they’ll feel safe in the knowledge that their sense of morals won’t interfere with them doing the right thing.
(By Francisco Little for Beijing Review, June 7, 2004)
