CHELSIE COATES - Writing

A chronological spewage of my thoughts and feelings into poetry and writing.
Usually, my text will accompany work in the form of print, sculpture, sound or performance. All of these are vessels for a completely personal insight to my own experiences growing up and now as an adult.
Feelings of displacement and anecdotal stories are the basis of my writing and a few specific stories outlined in "I am Not Chinese Enough to Actually be Chinese" are memories I recall often as dark moments in my life.

.orange slices and mint imperials II

6/6/2020

memories ingrained in

my mind

of

sticky juice running

down my chin and a

family far too stuffed to

even think about

dessert.

yet sweet wedges

of orange, for good luck

and after - a mint imperial

whilst they argue over

who takes the

bill.

How does a stereotype become the

reason for your existence

how it lets you authenticate yourself

tell you you’re worthy

tell you you’re Chinese

enough for everyone

looking on.

but we don’t even speak Chinese

I know that

our servers always know that.

perhaps it is confusing for them

to see a gaggle of Chinese ladies

and what looks like white children.

I’m not too sure

yet I am embarrassed every time I can’t

pronounce

my favourite

dish.

so instead I

distract myself,

with my own reflection

seen in the muddied glass of the aquarium

in the restaurant

the fish look back at me with blank expressions

they know

I am not Chinese enough

to *actually* be Chinese

they are judging me like

i judge myself.

I am only a child

yet so self reflective ?

not really,

probably just narcissistic.

Do children know that they don’t truly belong ?

I suppose they do.

I suppose I do.

my memories are often hazy,

elusive and just out of reach

perhaps the elusiveness of my belonging

is because I ate too many mint imperials as a child

after all,

no-one truly knows the origins of the sweet

or,

perhaps so long spent staring into the abyss of aquariums,

gave me the memory of my friend

the fish itself.

But even though

I am not enough

of any of my ethnicities,

I still have fond memories

of those aquariums

and just waiting for the sticky juice to run down my chin

when I bite into a sweet wedge of orange

for good luck.

i am not chinese enough to be verbally assaulted

4/21/2020

i can’t help but

sob

myself to sleep every night

thinking

of how dumb i must be to be

worried

about my insecurities when there are thousands

dying

every single day.

so what you’re not chinese enough ?

in times where being an eastern asian and having that run through your blood, even if

born

in WHATEVER country puts you at risk

to be

beaten and

tormented

for existing , i

weep

for my sisters and brothers who don’t have the luxury of

passing.

my auntie in new york wrote me a story of her first covid related injustice

a teller at the bank

happily chatting away to a customer prior to her,

upon my auntie reaching the booth , she

drew

up her scarf to cover her face ,

a makeshift mask,

and her demeanour

changed

to that of short tempered and dismissive.

perhaps you would

think nothing

of such a tale , if you are not the one to

live it

or understand the connotations alongside it .

but the teller was just

personifying

all those negative words people have spewed into the world to do with being a certain race

the president himself called it

a

chinese virus .

therefore ,

us chinese are to blame.

but i am not chinese enough

to be verbally assaulted

about bringing covid

to this country

yet my heart still weeps

in solidarity

for those who are.

. orange slices & mint imperials

4/13/2020

memories of

mint imperials

and

orange slices

at the end of a meal are

ingrained

in my mind as a treat after dinner,

everyone is far too full to ever eat

dessert.

but to wash down the bloated feeling,

refreshing wedges of orange.

and a mint imperial (or 5)

whilst people argue over who takes the

bill.

it’s funny when something so stereotyped becomes the

meaning of your existence.

how a piece of food is used to create a

false

sense

of

chinese-ness

and

is so subsequent to my sense of self.

but

the thing is,

no-one even knows who invented the mint.

it mirrors the the elusiveness of my

belonging.

just like

the memories

that slip through

the grasp

of a simple

aquarium fish

rice grains

3/9/2020

rice grains are like sand

if you let them slip through your

h a n d s

the panic you feel when you remember

that mum asked you to cook the rice

and you hear the car pull in the drive.

just like when you forget to defrost the

m e a t .

quickly boil some water.

not quite two cups for each cup of

l o n g g r a i n .
b a s m a t i .
j a s m i n e .

HOW TO USE CHOPSTICKS

2/24/2020

A fork in a bowl of dumplings is a physical oxymoron.

It is strange how funny the way chopsticks are seen as a utensil to

prove

one’s chinese-ness

Are chopsticks a form of power play for western eyes

to categorise

the lies

about what is

and is not

authentic.

And the instructions for how to use chopsticks

go like

this

place stick between

thumb

and index finger

then

rest on third finger of

right hand.

place second stick above first stick between

thumb

and index finger

rest on second finger with

points together.

move top stick up

and down

by raising

second finger.

FORTUNE COOKIE MESSAGES

1/30/2020

FINAL CHOICES:

when I was born, my family said to my mother she “just keeps making white babies” in reference to my sister and I.

when I was 8 I was told to go back to China by another child. I have never been to China, neither has my mother.

when I was always, I was asked where I was *really* from. The question always makes me panic.

when I was a teenager I was told by a boy he had a ‘thing’ for half Asians, I guess he meant mixed Eastern Asians ?

when I was now, I was told I don’t look Chinese enough, that I am not a real Asian. But yet I’m not white either ?

****

OTHER POSSIBILITIES :

oh but you don’t look Chinese ? are you sure you're half ?

yeah yeah but where are you REALLY from ?

but you don't even speak Chinese ?! you’re not a real Asian.

i've got a thing for orientals, they're so exotic.

(you look basically white though, you totally pass.)

you look exactly like [insert general Eastern Asian person that looks nothing alike]

****

reproduced into cheap satin

I am an ethnic nomad

they call it yellowfever

she just keeps making white babies

I am exotic

I AM NOT CHINESE ENOUGH TO ACTUALLY BE CHINESE

1/27/2020

My skin is white but tinted yellow.

People say I look exotic. That is just a manifestation of their Eurocentric ideas of beauty. Someone who can pass as white, yet has the slightest dash of minority across their face. If someone asks where I’m from,

I panic.

What are they asking me? probably curious as if they stared at my face long enough maybe they noticed my nose is ever so slightly wide and flat, my eyes smaller and slanted, and my cheeks full and high. My face is round and my height fairly small, my skin is not rosy and pink but subtly olive (I guess ?) they looked long enough and are now curious. Hoping I answer the answer they want to hear and not just telling them I’m from

a town outside of Cambridge.

Where are you really from ?

where are you really from. That question circles me and so many others until it becomes the centralised meaning of your existence. Without that question I am no longer a being.

I am an ethnic nomad.

Unplaceable by those who must categorise. By those who must seek out those palatable enough for the majority white public to consume but yet still provide a feeling of inclusivity. yet without,

actually

becoming

inclusive.

When I was a child I was told to go back to China. A fellow classmate. We were 8. I remember we were queuing up in the hall for lunch break.

I cried.

I didn’t understand. I had and have still never been to China. My mother has never been to China. Generations of my Chinese heritage were born and raised in Trinidad, Chinese-Trinidadian however is an ethnicity I have, at almost 22 given up on explaining. No, I am not quarter Chinese and quarter Trinidadian. I am so tired of trying to explain my ethnicity to people who push for a deeper answer, that saying I am just half Chinese is far simpler.

Hesitations in answers and obvious exasperation.

Where does pride and exhaustion meet ? where is acceptable to stop trying to explain ?

Narrowing of eyes

comes with questions of race.

But you don’t look Chinese

I know.

All my life I have wished what is deemed as a further hardship on myself. Darker hair. more mono-lidded eyes. a petite-er frame. Wishing these things upon myself seem almost a crime. Am i willing myself to experience more racial prejudice? No, just a sense of belonging. Neither completely welcome in either ethnicity. I don’t feel double-y emboldened into a sense of community. Just more empty than I really am. No one have I met who has the same exact ‘ethnicity’ as me. Apart from

my sister

We have both cried the same tears, both thought the same thoughts, both wanted to be more this and more that. No-one else will ever understand the exact diasporic feeling of despair when you find out your mother was told by her sisters when you were born that she

just keeps making white babies.

Rejected from the collection of family who look enough the part to fit in, so outcasts in our own people mean for outcasting in society too. No-one of us can speak any form of Chinese. I don’t even know when the last family member could. Maybe my mother’s grandparents ? Not sure. Does that make them not Chinese ? It certainly is a factor on people deciding that

I am not Chinese enough to actually be Chinese.

If so, but I still am a personification of the palatable exotic that people want, that means I neither belong in white society. Therefore, I have to question my own place of association every single day. I feel no community,

only alone.

Suddenly. I am 16 and being *kinda* Chinese is cool. they call it

yellowfever

the word is disgusting, and just a derogatory slang for men to fetishise Eastern Asian women.

I am

exotic.

But I am also white. I am exactly what a man wants to project his fantasy onto. But It also gave me a sense of actually finally being wanted in a society. A place to belong. A disgusting one at that but yet still. My

racially ambiguous

face was something I didn’t completely hate. for once.

I’m 16 and 17 and going to festivals. I am seeing girls in slutty versions of the dress that is hanging in the back of my cupboard. The one my great aunt passed down, a beautifully handmade cheongsam, so small just for her tiny frame, and only just fit me at 16. From then on no way was it going to zip up. The cheongsam’s silk fabric, reproduced into

cheap satin,

cut into the smallest triangles to make a bikini top, and a couple inches of length to make the shortest mini skirt I had ever seen. seeing this made me angry. I wasn’t sure why the first time. but, years later I know.

At 18 I saw more and more, and then ‘rice hats’ with wooly braided plaits trailing down the back. One time I was so pissed off I snatched it from someones head and chucked it. I then ran off, but realistically I should have told them why
what they were wearing was racist. But what if they told me

You have no right telling me what is and what isn’t racist

You don’t even look Chinese.

I know.

THE CHELSIE COATES MANIFESTO

1/23/2020

Chineseness should not flippantly be referred to as Oriental.
White privilege is appropriate to anyone. It is a varying degree, like a scale.
The Self and the Other are constructs created by a power imbalance lead by the West. The Self must take ownership for the privilege and help to rebalance order.
Those who pass as white are higher on the level of white privilege, and should use this privilege to help those of their minority brothers and sisters to regain balance.
No-one should be wearing sexualised versions of the cheongsam. Being an ethnic minority that is non Chinese should not excuse behaviour that should be classed as racism.
The idea of not ‘seeing colour’ is inherently problematic as it washes away millennia of prejudice and wrongdoing. We should see colour, not care about the differences, but remember the years of institutionalised immorality that must be rectified.
Racism is not just aggressive and in your face. It presents far more delicately in micro-aggressions, and stereotyping. Those who only see racism as the former are just as bad as those who ‘do not see race’.
The wearing and parading of ‘Oriental’ fashion, (not just clothing but beauty, culture and histories) or any minority at that, create a place for the Self to capitalise on ideals that the Other would be looked down upon for embracing.
Palatability is a huge effect on the way that traditions and looks are seen on any minority. Passing as white creates an intersection of a possibility for abuse of privilege vs. using ones pass-ability for helping those who do not pass.