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Expat egos cast shadows

By Steve Hubrecht (China Daily)
Updated: 2010-04-20 08:04

The Western woman sitting at the other end of the subway car, talking in her cellphone, becomes clearly agitated, raising her voice so everybody else can hear.

"What do you mean the ayi didn't cook dinner," she bellows, "doesn't she know she's supposed to do that? Doesn't she know anything?"

A long silence ensues, during which somebody on the other end of the call is talking. The woman's face is flushed red with anger. She rolls her eyes.

"Well this is just fantastic," she continues, voice dripping with acidic sarcasm, then lets out an exaggerated sigh of disgust before clicking off the phone.

Other passengers sitting or standing nearby shuffle their feet and cast their eyes downward at the floor, thrust their noses in newspapers or try to look absorbed in the screens on their cellphones. It's remarkably quiet for the Beijing subway.

A half minute later, the woman's phone rings and she answers with broken Chinese and barely controlled fury. She spits out her words with a sneer, then switches back to English.

"I don't know what we're supposed to do now," she says as she finishes her rant, still yelling. "Can she cook any Western food? Does she know how to do that?"

After a few more awkward minutes, the subway arrives at the woman's station, she gets off and the other passenger relax a bit.

The whole scenario is embarrassing not only because of the woman's public tirade, but also (for other foreigners in the subway car) because of her obvious contempt toward the ayi.

Her obvious disgust at the idea of eating something other than Western food and the implied impossibility of the woman or the English-speaking person who was on the other end of the initial call (who presumably lives with her) going into the kitchen and whipping up a meal didn't help elicit much sympathy for her.

It's not fair to make assumptions and clearly nobody on the subway except for the woman on the phone knew the full context of the situation. But still, it's hard to not think that, with a Jenny Lou's grocery store stocked full of Western goods and a plethora of restaurants (both Chinese and foreign) near the woman's subway station. Her situation didn't warrant such as public display of anger, or even really any anger at all.

Can't have somebody prepare a meal to your liking for you in your own home? Have to head to a restaurant or maybe even eat Chinese food while living in China? Have to cook your own dinner? Gosh, the hardships of being an expatriate in China.

Unfortunately it's an attitude shared by at least a few expatriates and it tends to paint all foreigners (most of who, if they have ayi, treat them with the respect they deserve) in a bad light.

A few pinheads let being an expatriate go to their heads and their egos and expectations inflate with equal measure. They demand their whims be catered to at a level that would draw withering glares from servers and maids in the West. But because they are in a foreign country and feel like big shots, they have no qualms about berating a waitress, nanny or driver for anything less than perfection.

And to making their act even harder for others, including the overwhelming majority of foreigners in Beijing, to swallow is that these self-important expatriates often demand perfection while paying a pittance.

Sure, if you're going to pay $25-$30 per hour for somebody to clean your house - which is the going rate in some parts of North America - you'd expect it to be in relatively good shape after. But when you're paying 3,000 yuan (about $400) or less per month for an ayi to clean your place, do your grocery shopping, look after your kids and cook your dinner, you don't get license to complain ad nauseum about how hard it is to find good help these days.

It's hard to avoid the conclusion that these people are taking advantage of the wealth gap between their home countries and rural China (where most ayi come from) to indulge in a lifestyle they couldn't afford at home. And there's nothing inherently wrong about that or with having as many domestic helpers as you want, as long as you treat them fairly and respectfully.

Most foreigners who hire ayi do just that and in the process gain insight into Chinese culture that never otherwise would get. But sadly a handful of arrogant jerks take it upon themselves to behave in ways they wouldn't consider at home (and shouldn't anywhere) and in the process make all foreigners look bad.