And... Oh, my lady Gaga!...There's white people!

Note: Many Chinese people love to say "Oh, my lady Gaga!".

For the first weeks in Shanghai I had to get used to being stared at by people on the street, waiters, Expo visitors and, later on, by my students.

In the neighborhood our villa was in there were probably no other foreigners, so we were quite a sensation that people could not take their eyes off. It was uncomfortable at the beginning and I hated the idea of being permanently analyzed, but at the same time it was funny to watch their reactions: giggles, stares, elbowing their friends.

But the funniest thing was that people asked to take pictures of us or with us. At some point we were thinking about asking them to take a picture using our cameras, but we gave up on the idea really soon – took up too much space on our memory cards. The first times it felt weird, but soon I became used to the idea and smiled and did my Asian pose, having fun with being such a “celebrity”. There is one particular incident that is worth mentioning: Dan and I were waiting for our kids in the Expo parking lot, when this teenager walks up to us, asks to take a picture with Dan, then hands us each a fake Haibao (the Haibao is the mascot of the Expo), and leaves. We have no idea who the kid was, but after that our students gave us a very hard time for having fake Expo products.

Many people also wished us a happy stay in China, thinking that we might be regular tourists. That was ok for the first weeks, but later we felt that we actually belonged there and it was revolting to be treated as new comers. Others were too shy to approach us and just analyzed us from a distance, taking pictures with their phone cameras or watching us from under their “lady Gaga” masks. Even some of the students were really shy and did not dare to take pictures, but once one of them did, all the others would take their cameras out and I knew I had to keep smiling.

For some reason, everything about us was so novel that had to be investigated. Kids loved to touch us, look at our eyelids (yes, they did ask me if mine were real), smell us, or just pull the guys’ hair (Dan was called monkey-teacher because he had facial hair). Also, everything we did was impressive: all of us were in an elevator with two of our students and Tim opened a Pepsi bottle for one of them – their reaction:” Whooooaaa!”.

But I think Jake had it the worse since people did not expect him to speak fluent Chinese. Most people were shocked in surprise and had to tell him multiple times “Your Chinese is really good!” (phrase that I came to recognize in their dialogues after hearing it soooo much).

All in all, many times it felt like being in a zoo – a new species, outside its natural habitat, that needs to be investigated.