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In my first week as a journalism teacher, I inherited a class of senior students as they were halfway through their program.
A hand shot up.
“You’re the first journalist of colour we’ve had as an instructor,” said the student. “What’s that like?”
Ah! It happened again! I had stepped into a circle and inherited that title: the First Asian Person to Be Seen Doing a Thing.
If you’re a person of colour, you’ll know that being the first to do something is a big deal, especially if you’re breaking into a white-dominated field.
May is Asian Heritage Month, the time of year when journalists, politicians, and institutions celebrate these firsts, from the Vivian Jungs (the first Chinese Canadian teacher in Vancouver) to the Wally Oppals (the first South Asian Supreme Court judge in B.C.). I once interviewed an old Vancouver family, the illustrious Yips, whose forebears included the first Chinese Canadian doctor and lawyer—talk about a double whammy!
Saturday Night Live even spoofed the phenomenon with actors Simu Liu and Bowen Yang, who tried to one-up each other with accomplishments such as “the first Asian male host”, “the first Asian man to do a Cher impression on NBC”, and “the first Asian man to deadpan on Splash Mountain”.
But the thing about these firsts—even the ones joked about on SNL—is that they’re historic.
To be the first to make an achievement implies that the ceiling has been broken for good. And so we celebrate Asian Canadian firsts as if they’re Asian Canadian lasts: the last to experience discrimination, the last to face obstacles in their pursuits, the last to live through racist times.
Vancouver’s Margaret Jean Gee was both one of the first Chinese Canadian women called to the bar (in 1954), and also one of the first Chinese Canadian female Pilot Officers in the Royal Canadian Air Force Reserves.
But there are plenty of firsts that aren’t recognized: the bad ones that still go on, or the ones my peers and I live through regularly. Even if we’re not the first person to do something in Canada, we might be treated that way if we’re doing something novel in the eyes of strangers.
An Asian Canadian friend was once called “disgusting” for eating a red bean dessert at work: the First Asian Person to Bring Foreign Food Not Yet Approved by White People into the Office.
Another was constantly asked how she was enjoying life in Richmond, despite having moved to Vancouver: how groundbreaking that she was the First Asian Person to Live Away from Her Own Kind.
Another who had become a doctor had their credentials questioned by her elderly white patients: I didn’t realize I was friends with the First Asian Woman with the Ability to Study Medicine.
Another who had children with a white partner was mistaken for the family’s nanny: how strange that she was the First Asian Person to Be Around a White-Looking Child and Is Actually Their Parent.
Being the first also means fielding questions on Asian languages, histories, and cultures, whether we know about them or not. We’re asked to put in extra labour towards diversity initiatives, somehow responsible for how others treat us. We’re expected to smile when greeted with a “ni hao”, to pat someone on the back for using chopsticks, to marvel at vacations taken in our ancestral homelands.
These interactions are too often explained away. “They’re just ignorant, don’t take it to heart!” “They’re just curious about culture and identity!” “The question wasn’t meant to offend.”
It was nice to see solidarity against anti-Asian racism during the pandemic, but that’s easy. Who wouldn’t be against public violence toward Asian seniors?
But the fact that the novelty of our presence is still singled out, aggressively or not, means that there are unspoken expectations about where we and our cultures belong. Why else is it weird to see an Asian person in a new field or new neighbourhood? Or that our cultures are only cool when white people access them? Or that thousands can enjoy Vaisakhi parades without doing more to address the renewed hate against South Asian students?
The higher we climb, the more friction we face.
Vancouver is a good place for racism to hide. Our city has Asian names on buildings, Asian culture everywhere, even an Asian Canadian mayor (our first!). It’s easy to point to these markers and imagine that we live in multicultural harmony.
Wally Oppal was B.C.’s first South Asian Supreme Court Judge, and the province’s second Indian Canadian Attorney General. Simon Fraser University/Wikimedia
More than half of Metro Vancouverites are racialized, but there are many places where showing your face, walking with your family, wearing religious headcoverings, or speaking anything other than English will prompt stares, comments, or worse.
Older Asian Canadians have told me that our achievements, our invitation to assimilate, and our accumulation of wealth are proof of progress. But while these privileges bring some protection and peace of mind, they do not banish racism.
I hope that one day we can be free of having to think twice about what our presence might prompt.
Until that day, I’ll say this to my fellow Asian Canadians:
Keep taking up space in new places. Keep pushing back when we’re questioned. Keep braving those firsts.