Yesterday I was on my way into work and I was waiting for my tram with the 20 or so other people when I saw a spare seat under the shelter. I always take advantage of spare seats….I have little legs and they get tired! Anyways I found myself sitting next to a girl about the same age as me who I found out was an exchange student from China. We started chatting as she had really good english and she was very friendly. As we chatted up a storm I started to get a bit peckish and got out a biscuit I had just bought from my favourite nearby asian grocer. A biscuit this girl told me was a huge favourite within China. I started telling her about how in Australia we have a very popular biscuit too called the ANZAC biscuit. She just started cracking up laughing as she got out her morning tea snack and to my delight it was exactly that….an ANZAC biscuit! How funny and quite ironic really!

I thought it was awesome to see that two people from two totally different cultures were able to have the accessibility and the opourtunity to venture out and experience different cultures right to the core. She was able to experience Australia in all forms….She wasn’t just a Chinese girl in Australia, she was able to fit into the community and see Australia through how an Australian would experience Australia. On the other hand I was able to experience the Chinese culture without even leaving the country which just shows how diverse the Australian culture really is. 

We continued to chat and we shared each others experience of growing up. I told her about growing up in suburban Melbourne where running through the sprinkler and having plum fights with the neighbour kids next door was a usual experience during the summer. She told me about growing up on a rice farm in country China, where working hard to feel as though you were worthy enough for the family was a constant pressure. Even the fact that she didnt get to go to school until she was 15 years old which was just a shock to me. I learnt so much in that 20 minutes while we waited for the tram and I am so glad I got to share  a splash of green moment with someone else!

Before we parted ways I asked her whether she had had any experiences on her travels through Melbourne that she wasn’t  expecting. She told me that the majority of people have been the nicest people she has ever met! But she was in total shock when a couple of young men she encounted on a train ride were calling her an “asian invader”. She said she really didnt expect that because there was so much positive Chinese culture all around Melbourne. I was so angry and embarassed that she had to experience that and I felt like I need to explain it….well I didnt know how to explain it other than they are hopefully the minority and they are obviously cruel and immature individuals.

It just blows me away how some people are just so rude. Why would you want to get your kicks out of  taking a bite out of someone else’s heart?

The only bite I got out of meeting this lovely girl was realising how lucky I am to live with and meet so many different people, but even in that I found that the fact is that we are not actually that different, we are the same…We both like biscuits, we love to chat and we are both human beings!