October 15, 2011

not a caucasian toddler

Jubilee is not Caucasian.  There are many clues that lead me to this conclusion, other than her Chinese passport.
- Her English has an accent.  "Car" is "kigh."  "More" is "muoy."  "Door" is "doy."  Not your typical toddler twang.
- She has no rear end.  Enough said there.
- She runs like a dis-jointed penguin being chased by a polar bear.  It is adorable.  No marathons for this girl, I'm afraid.  I am not saying this is true of all Chinese people, of course.  Not hardly.  I'm merely saying that Jubilee is not exactly built for speed.
- When our family gets a headcold, she doesn't seem to suffer with pressure and pain like the rest of us.  It all just comes pouring out.  In fact (bear with me here), if you get a hold of something with a tissue, you can pull the whole cold right out of her face.  It's fascinating, really.  I'm no doctor, nor anthropologist, but my guess is the structure of her face and the position of her sinuses must cause this?  Asian friends, does this happen to you?  It really must be nice.
- Her skin has a year-round brown tone, always even and glowing.  Now THAT would be nice!
- Her mouth is wide, with plenty of room for her teeth to sit sit-by-side.  Again, jealous.
- She hates to swim.  I am not so much noting a Chinese trait as much as I am noting the fact that white people really might just as well have webbed feet.

Though it might seem funny for me to be talking about my daughter's race, and comparing it to my own, this is a very common practice around here.  They tell us we have big noses.  Well, we do.  They tell us we are fat.  Many, many of us are.  They aren't being cruel, they are just interested in these differences.  Among their own race, they talk about what people-group a person is from, and how the different groups compare.  When locals see Jubilee, they want to know where she is from.  As soon as we tell them she is GuangDongRen, they say, "Ah, yes, she has the Cantonese nose."  We just nod.  We don't know the differences as well as they do.  What we do know is that she aint no white, softball-playing Arkansan, nor is she a towering, volleyball-playing dutch girl from Holland, Michigan.

And that is just fine with us:)