Bigotry Is Ugly In Any Language
My friend and I are taking the subway. We are both Mexicans and both look like Mexicans, but my friend asked me to talk to him exclusively in Mandarin, in which I’m fluent, so that he can practise.
A middle-aged woman gets on the subway and stares, giving us a strange look. I think nothing about it since it’s not common to hear a conversation in Mandarin in a Mexico City subway.
Suddenly, she suddenly says, quite loudly, in Spanish, “D*** Chinese. They’re everywhere! They come, open a restaurant, exploit their Mexican employees, and take all of our money back to China; they don’t even try to learn Spanish.” Then she goes, “Ching chang chun li,” trying to imitate Chinese.
My friend and I begin to laugh, which only makes her get angrier and turn blood red.
I respond to her, in Spanish, “Ma’am, we’re both Mexicans, and most surely can speak better Spanish than you do!”
A few people on the subway laugh really hard. The woman turns an even brighter shade of red and suddenly remembers she has to get off at the next station.
This story is part of our Subway roundup!
Read the next story in this roundup!
Read the Subway roundup!
Question of the Week
Have you ever met a customer who thought the world revolved around them?
