how to make me angry

This past weekend, we walked down to a local coffee shop since the weather is finally getting nice.  Right when i was trying to back our stroller out of the coffee shop, this man steps in.  He was pretty much blocking us in.

"Is your daughter Chinese?"  he asks.

"No," I say.  "I'm Chinese American."

"Oh," he says.  "Do you speak Mandarin?"

"No," I say.  "I'm third generation American."

"Oh.  Well, you know, people in China said that I speak mandarin better than a Chinese person."

At this point, I started to go off on him about how I was born and raised in America, and how I don't speak Chinese and.. and... and... then he got all like, "Hey, I'm just trying to make conversation." Blah blah blah.  He was a middle-aged white male, and clearly I was getting sketchy vibes from him.  Did he not realize that i was in the process of backing the stroller OUT of the coffeeshop?

It frustrates me that he brought Tae into it.  That he made all kinds of assumptions about us.  That he couldn't talk about god damn weather if he really just wanted make conversation.  It frustrates me that I just get angry and don't have it in me to turn this into a teachable moment.  It frustrates me that in situations like this, I am powerless.  He had the power to make me uncomfortable and upset, and I had nothing.

What do you say in situations like this?

*cross posted at kimchi mamas 

Comments

[honglien123]

That sucks, what a rude idiot. I always think of decent lines in hindsight. If that were me, I probably would have thought in my head, "Well, you look [insert non-British European ethnicity here], do you speak [that language]? No? Well why the hell do you think I speak Chinese?" OR "You obviously don't understand English since you didn't understand a single word I said."

But of course, if that were me, I would have actually said, "I'm sorry, you're blocking me in."

[jenney]

vinh usually gets this all the time. He still has a slight accent and obviously not born here. But my favorite idiot story was when he was getting his hair cut:
barber: where are you from?
v: canada
barber: no you have an accent..
v: quebecoise.. we are french canadaian!
barber: oh I thought I could hear a french-canadian accent
v: yeah something like that.

I almost pee'd my pants trying not to laugh. He looks very obviously chinese and has a very obvious vietnamese-cantonese accent.

I have a very french-canadian last name and no one ever assumed I spoke french until I worked in canada for a bilingual company. It seems like an american thing to assume all asian people speak chinese.

[orrielynn]

i think you handled it just fine. it sounds like he got the message.