Gweilo

Hong Kong and racism, sounds like something that happens only through the expats coming to Hong Kong. At least that’s what most people will probably assume, because the only people who can be racist are “white” people. Sorry to burst your bubble but Asia as a whole is extremely racist, towards other countries, be they white people, other Chinese people or other Asians, and they blatantly show their favouritism in their laws and in public. In Hong Kong for instance there are several names that get used by Hong Kongers to describe those around them who aren’t Hong Kong Chinese, such as gweilo meaning to describe a white person. The funny thing about that is the fact that that word has now been adopted by those who it used to describe and make feel bad about themselves. I personally say to my friends when I’m at home that I am a gweilo and it has become part of a joke, “who is that gweilo I see?”, “oh it’s Milena”, I own the word, but the word does not own me.

There is nothing more infuriating than to hear a local person use racist slurs such as “bun bun” to address Filipinos, (a term derived from the Cantonese word for the Philippines, “Fei Lut Bun”), “ah chah” (similar to the Hindi word “acha” which means OK) to refer to Indians and Pakistanis or call black people “black ghost” in Cantonese.

Now the article does raise the question why local Hong Kongers feel that it is alright to use those words to describe other people and what can be done about it. Personally, I have no real answer to the question, other than for those who get called these names to learn how to accept the description and make it theirs rather than letting Hong Kongers continue to hurt them with the name. Once you do that it becomes less hurtful and annoying to hear it.

Another aspect that the article touches on is the brand names of certain products, which in other languages have already been changed but continue to be called the original name in Cantonese. One such example made was the name for a brand of toothpaste that is quite popular in China and Hong Kong, Darlie, which changed its English name from Darkie to the one being used currently. The thing though is that it is still being referred to as “Black Man” in Cantonese, which comes across as extremely racist considering that on the front of the packaging there is an outline of a man in black, though the question is what can be done about it. I suggest there should be a competition to see what new packaging can be produced that might change the name in Chinese if the packaging no longer looks like a black man.