108

On the first day of Monash Saturday school, literally every kid called me 'China'.

And played with my hair.

It took quite some time to teach them to call me by my name, not 'China'.

I found it interesting that people often refer the whole Asia to one country, China.

There are 48 different nations in Asia.

But then how come all these 48 nations can be generalised to one nation, China?

I do understand that China is huge and its impact is relatively massive politically, economically and socially in the world.

But still.

That is the problem with the term, Asia as well.

When people refer things to Asia, they tend to only link to China, Japan, Korea and Thailand.

Saudi Arabia is actually belonged to Asia continent.

Turkey is also part of Asia.

Kazakhstan is in Asia too.

Mmmmmm.

The same thing goes to generalising Africa.

People often mistake that Africa is a big huge one country.

And everyone looks the same.

Everyone behaves the same.

Everyone believes in the same religion.

Everyone practices the same culture.

Dang.

Not a good answer.

It actually contains 54 different nations.

Generalisation or rather easily explained 'stereotyping' is not really a wise thing to practice.

It is because it keeps you only in certain ways.

It would prevent you from seeing things from different angles.

It is easy to associate one to his/her nationality, because it seems to tell everything about him/her.

Yet, you do not know him/her that much.

One's passport can't tell every story of the person.

So why not just get to know the person without fitting him/her into your perceptions of country where he/she is from? :)

Taken in Johannesburg.