It can be hard being a white person is Asia. Obviously I'm stupidly lucky compared to a lot of the locals. I am educated, I have health insurance, I can afford to travel across the world to be here. But occasionally I go through phases when the constant being ripped off gets to me. The way rice noodle soup will cost 3 Yuan when you go with your Chinese friend but double the price when you go back alone the next day. The bananas- you ask "how much?”, in Chinese. He answers, in Chinese, “8 Kwai”. He looks up and sees you are foreign- the price is suddenly in English and much higher. “You said 8 already. Not good, not good” is all the arguing my mandarin is up to. Not good, not good. I get
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