American Difference

Last Friday I had a meetup with my friends Ha Le and Jean Baptiste in Paris. This was the very first time I had a meetup purely for the purpose of a meetup with multiple people, and I was overjoyed to do it at a place as great as Paris! Ha Le and I met at Montparnasse and walked to the Luxembourg Gardens together to meet up with Jean Baptiste.

As we sat down for a cup of coffee in the garden, we talked about how we have been doing and what we’re up to these days. Normally these interactions are among Americans simply because of the fact that… I live in America. But I found myself as a minority coming from America talking with two French people.

What is the most different thing about America and France? What stands out to me the most? In my very limited personal experience in Paris and somewhat limited personal experience in America since I mostly spent my life in places where minorities are more accepted, I notice how minorities integrate differently.

In Paris, I see minorities but they don’t run minority-operated businesses. The Chinese restaurants and Vietnamese restaurants here are filled with people of all colors and origins. Same with French and American brunch restaurants. I see a group of Asian people walk by but if they’re not tourists they’re always speaking French instead of Korean/Japanese/Mandarin or what else have you. Even the Korean beauty store nearby has customers wearing hijabs.

In America I notice minority-run businesses cater more towards minorities. This happens in Koreatown, Chinatown, Little Tokyo in Los Angeles and I’ve seen it happen in Thai, Vietnamese, and Indian communities as well. They form pockets of neighborhoods that serve as a community for that ethnicity and it somewhat becomes a silo.

So yes, Southern California is a melting pot but it’s more of a pot that has a lot of separate ingredients in it. Whereas in France (disclaimer again: I haven’t really visited a Chinatown or anything like that in Paris yet) that seems to be less of a case. Although yesterday’s visit to the 18th arrondissement seemed like it was a very African pocket of Paris. Who knows? Maybe my opinion will change after a few more visits.

Based on my experience as a Korean participating in these Korean silos (I was that during my formative years in school), this kind of a community tends to form because it’s difficult for minorities to stand on their own without the help of their community. Koreans have a hard time adjusting to America without other Koreans so they naturally congregate to the Korean church even if they’re not Christian. I’m sure other ethnicities have their version of this as well.

I tried to attend a French intensive language program here and what I noticed is they all offered some sort of a student visa to come here without too much trouble. Of course they have student visas in America too but it’s the story as old as time: $$$. The tuition to properly come to France to study French is a fraction of what you might pay in America to do the same thing with.

One might enjoy just being a student and go back to their home country but chances are you might like the country enough to stay there. How flexible are the policies to stay in the country you studied in? That is always up to policy changes but based on how things are going right now, Europe seems to be more future-promising in that regard as well.

From the minority’s perspective I think environments like Europe force them to assimilate as soon as possible (though there are groups of ethnicities that already formed a giant bubble like LA’s Koreatown) or get out. This can be a good or a bad thing. Environments like America make it easier for people to settle but at that point you’re just doing the same thing as home, but in a different environment. I know a lot of Koreans who don’t even speak English after years of being in the U.S..

But speaking from the majority’s perspective, siloed approaches to minority groups have an alienating effect. I know this because throughout high school I have heard many non-Korean friends say it’s difficult to talk to Koreans because they’re always in a group and hanging out among themselves.

Perhaps this is what’s responsible for the majority-minority dynamic in America. All the minorities are together in the same physical space but they rely on each other and not the greater collective. Then why do minorities need that banding so much? What is it about the American life that’s so challenging? If we didn’t find the American life challenging, if we didn’t suffer in America — would things look different?

These are the questions I tried asking and answering myself. I tried speaking a lot of French and yes, trying to learn a new language is hard. As I learn new social customs I find myself cowering and reducing in case I fuck up. But I willingly chose to be here and I’m making sure I make the best of this learning opportunity.

Wherever we are in life, are we choosing to be here?