I'm a Chinese girl, and I'm also a Christian. After I came to AA, I've never been to a Chinese church since I don't wanna just hang out with Chinese. If I did that, I don't think I would be able to find the meaning of going abroad. So I pick up a pure white church here, New Life Church, and take a try there. Finally I find out that it is really an awesome church, then I decide to settle down there.
At the beginning, life there was really awesome. People are nice and they really love God, just as I do. I did not find it really hard to make friends with them. But later on, some underlying problems started to pop out. I'm an international student, and English is not my first language. Sometimes I find it so hard to talk to them, follow what they are talking about, and tell them what I am thinking about. I want, but I don't know what to say and how to say. At first I thought I was totally fine with it. People don't need to keep talking if they don't know what to say. Just stay with them and they can understand it. I comfort myself by keep telling myself this truth.
Then one night in a party of the church, we were playing a game called "trivial". The host will ask different groups of people several questions. The answers to these questions come from some random but trivial facts.In a round, when the host asked us which part of Britain is the smallest one in size. My first reaction was to say the Northern Ireland. I remember it clearly since I was best at the world map in high school. Then I told my group members. They seemed not really believe in me, and they finally chose another part. However, it turned out that my answer was correct. I was not angry because I kept silent for quite a while before I gave my opinion. So it quite makes sense they don't believe me. They may think that I've got a language problem, then how I can get the correct answer.
On our way back home, one of our group members said sorry to me suddenly. I was surprised because I didn't think there was anything to sorry about. Then his response really shocked me: "We didn't trust you. I'm sorry." At that time I felt really awkward. "Trust" is a big and serious word. Initially I just thought that they didn't believe I could get the correct answer, but I never relate it to "trust". His apology really upset me because that revealed their distrust on me.
That was the first time when I felt that I was actually an outsider of that circle. White people always put an Asian label on me and keep reminding me of my identity which is given away by my awkward English.
