Do Chinese people like to stick together? I frequently hear this labelled about the Chinese community in Vancouver. These comments are so frequent, that they cross the newspaper into my personal life. Friends want to know whether my parents only hire Asians, and other typical generalizations. The answer is a resounding NO!

My parents hire a elderly Caucasian Canadian accountant, an Indian electrician, a Middle Eastern car repairman, contractors/handymen that range from Caucasian Canadian to Eastern European. Yes there might be a few Asians, there is a Vietnamese gardener, and sometimes a Chinese plumber.

If you know anything about Asians, you will know that one Asian is not like the next. I thank my lucky stars and my parents that I was educated in an International School in Malaysia (Fairview and Sayfol). I grew up since kindergarten with people from all over the world including Caucasians, Indians, Malays and Chinese. My best friends in junior school were 2 East Indian girls. One of my best friends in high school was a dutch girl from Holland.

A comment might be made about Richmond or Chinatown having a high density of Asians, well my response would be don't tell me that white people don't like to hang out with each other, it is just not called white town. A passing comment made recently to me made me realize that I am living in a white neighborhood (Kits), have white friends and was working in a mostly white company. Nobody makes as much a big deal about a company that has only white people than if it were filled with Asians. Somehow it is something more to remark on.

Of course you might say that it is the Asians themselves that comment on these groupings. That to me means that the Asian person is actually more acutely aware of segregation and would prefer to mix with others.

I began to question some of my initial encounters in Canada. When we first arrived in Canada, my mother brought me to the education center to try to figure out what high school to attend for my Grade 12. I believe at that time we were living with friends in Burnaby, so I was given a choice of what school to choose. I knew nothing, so I chose a name that was given, and I was told, no not that one, how about Eric Hamber, it is a good school. So my mother and I not knowing any better said sure, why not. Frankly it was culture shock for me, for it was made up of a majority of cultures that I was not that familiar with; people from Taiwan, Hong Kong.

The English teacher in Eric Hamber, had interest to help poor shy me, to adapt to this new country. She would talk with me after class and ask me if I was making any friends. I remember one time, I said well there is Megan, she seems quite nice, I think we could be friends. She discouraged me from Megan, and encouraged me to make friends with Cindy. Structuring the seating and projects so that I would have more interaction with Cindy. The difference between Cindy and Megan? Megan was Caucasian whereas Cindy was a Taiwanese Canadian.

I wonder if the insistence of Canada's multicultural Mosaic policy is segregation cloaked, such as the segregation experienced in the 1920's: "school segregation seemed to involve little more than 'carrying into the schools what already exists in every other institution of society--the branding of Chinese as Ishmaelites.'"

Or as Kay Anderson argues, however, that "Chinatown" is a Western construction, illustrative of a process of cultural domination that gave European settlers in North America and Australia the power to define and shape the district according to their own images and interests.