From my photo, you can tell that I am ethnically Chinese. Being Chinese is not something I think about too much. I moved from Taiwan to Australia when I was three years old. I don’t usually affiliate myself with the Chinese culture except that I love the cuisine and I’ve had done some years of Chinese language classes.

I could write a lot about why this is, how I’ve met lots of non-Chinese people who are fascinated with China and how this perplexes me.

But.

I won’t.

Not now, anyway. I feel something similar to shame on this topic, which I need to analyse before I can explain myself.

I do, however, have three Chinese-related thoughts I’d like to share now, on the cusp of the Beijing Olympics.

Firstly, as I’ve explained to a few people recently, the only time I’ve been harassed in my ‘dangerous‘ neighbourhood was when two black kids, a little girl and a little boy, started shouting ‘Ching chong! Ching chong!’ at me as I walked home. To which I could shouted back, ‘I don’t understand what you’re saying!’

Secondly, I was struck by a lightning bolt of understanding a few months ago. I like accents. I like hearing English spoken by people from South Africa, France, Germany, America… Yet, I cringe a little when I hear Chinese spoken with an accent. I couldn’t figure out why I have this double standard. My mum once said to me I spoke Chinese with an Australian accent — and this was not a good thing.

Finally, I figured it out. Chinese is a tonal language. Each syllable can be said in four ways, so even small variations in pitch changes the meaning of a word. Speaking Chinese with accent sounds ‘wāi wāi’ （歪歪）, which means ‘wonky’.

Vietnamese has five tones and Cantonese has six tones!

My final Chinese thought — I have just watched a Chinese man, Ming Yun, pitch for a cash investment on the TV show, Dragon’s Den. Inside me, I really wanted him to do well. For some reason, even though I am not very Chinese and I don’t know many very Chinese people, I identify with them more strongly than I think I should. When I read about Chinese people who can’t afford to buy the right spectacles, I feel like crying. When I see a Chinese baby, I smile. A few months ago, I watched a film in which a father and mother in China were used and neglected by their children, who wanted to live Western lives in the city. It was very distressing and, of course, made me cry.

I think it’s because I can imagine Chinese people as my parents, my brother, my grandparents, my aunts and my uncles. Therefore, I am very vulnerable to tears when I hear about the suffering of a Chinese person.