The Foreign Service Journal, July-August 2010

ture-taking locals; to converse with strangers about my fam- ily size; to admit, during nearly every conversation I start on any given day, that I simply don’t understand what I’mhear- ing. I haggle at the local markets, and I do it in the local lan- guage when I can. But I’ve come to expect that no matter what I do or say, I won’t be getting the local price. I’m a tai tai, after all, which to them means I have money to spare and no real sense of how much something should cost. No matter how polite I am, no matter how insistent that I live here, I’m one of you — I’ll still be charged a markup. It’s a tricky balance, this tai tai business, and every time I think I’ve figured it out, some new strangeness bumps up against me. The last time I was at the store, I stood in line behind three Chinese women. I had just a few things inmy basket, while the woman in front of me, an ayi, was loaded down with two overflowing baskets. As I stood in line, try- ing to decipher the chatter around me, the manager ap- proached. He greeted me as he reached past the ayi, who was struggling with her heavy baskets, and took my small basket from me. She didn’t complain, and neither did I: I didn’t have the words to explain that I did not need help, to point out that she might. So I stood, silently, a tai tai once again, too delicate to holdmy own loaf of bread. Wealthy, but weak. Is that what I am here? I don’t know; I can’t know. I can’t make them understand that I’m used to hauling my own groceries up the stairs, pumping my own gas, scrubbing my own toilets. How can I possibly tell someone without running water that I, too, know what it is to live a hand-to-mouth existence? They wouldn’t believe me, anyway. I’m a tai tai. I’m differ- ent. Comfortable Being Uncomfortable It’s taken years in the Foreign Service to finally under- stand that I’m never going to fit in — that maybe I’m not supposed to fit in. When we started down this path so many years ago, I thought I would grow to be the kind of person who could navigate through any city with ease, effortlessly reading the faces of passers-by in countries across the globe. Instead, my life as a diplomatic spouse has turned me into the kind of person who is comfortable being uncomfortable; who can accept the fact that in any given situation, I’ll miss some- thing important and possibly come off looking like a snob, or even an idiot. Instead of becoming a global citizen, fitting in on any continent, I’m turning into someone who never quite fits in anywhere. Here I am, about to finish up a three-year tour in China; yet the idea of life here still frightens me sometimes. I’m still an outsider, and many of my everyday interactions are fraught with confusion. How to tell the taxi driver he’s made a wrong turn? How to ask the tailor to shorten a hem? How to understand what the ayi is telling me about how my daughters spent their morning while I was away at work? I’m learning to accept the fragments of comprehension that come my way. I’m learning to laugh at myself. I’m learning to accept the fact that others will misread me, just as I have trouble figuring them out. I have to hold on to what I know is true about myself, even if those around me seldom see me the way I see my- self. Inside of my house, here in Beijing, I’m just your av- erage Americanmom, helpingmy kids with their homework as I prepare dinner, and that’s how it should be. But out in the wide world, I’m a tai tai, floating above the crowd, somehow assumed to be worthy of respect. And I suppose that’s okay, too. ■ 18 F O R E I G N S E R V I C E J O U R N A L / J U LY- A U G U S T 2 0 1 0 F O C U S