My AP Language and Composition teacher once asked us to write an essay on an aspect of ourselves that made us a "minority" in a given environment or situation. I focused mine on how it felt to be "American." But perhaps the correct term to use would be “American-Chinese.”

Let me explain.

My dad has this running “joke” in my family. Unlike him and my mom, my sister and I had both been born in the United States, which apparently gave him permission to label the two of us as “American” while he, on the other hand, who is still in possession of his Chinese citizenship and was classified under a completely different group of species, is known as “Chinese.”

And so, whenever my sister and I would both get mad and start arguing with him, he’d cut us off and snort: “Why do you Americans always bully us other countries?”

(It’s his attempt at trying to divert the focus of our anger with a political joke.)

Hilarious.

In my hometown of Johns Creek, where half the town is occupied by citizens of various Asian-American backgrounds, I was nothing out of the ordinary. I liked the fusion of different cultures. I liked the fact that I, a yellow person, could walk on the streets without a well-intended someone coming up to warmly shake my hand and welcome me to America (which happened to me once at a McDonald’s in Montana; it was a strange experience).

But every couple of years or so, my sister and I would go to visit our motherland. More specifically, we’d go to our mom’s hometown of Nanchong in the Sichuan province of China, a small town of natives, many of who had never stepped foot out of Sichuan. Of course no eager Chinese folks ever ran up to welcome us to their country and ask to take a picture with us (an African American friend of mine once experienced this phenomenon on a visit to Beijing), but in China, being American suddenly meant a lot more than being Chinese ever did in Johns Creek.

Being American — well, Chinese-American — means that when you politely inform people that you are, in fact, American, they hesitate before they curiously reply:

“可是你是真的美国人吗?” But are you actually American?

To be fair, they’re not completely at fault for this one. You have to keep in mind that a majority of these people have never even seen the world outside of mainland China and their only window to the strange land across the ocean is the media. And if the only people they’re seeing in American movies are white, then who is to blame but Hollywood?

But to people who already know you (or think they know you), being American means that you’re deaf.

In other words, being American means that your relatives will gossip about how tall you’ve gotten, how tan you are (a punishable crime according to Chinese beauty standards), and how much weight you’ve gained — all right in front of your face at the dinner table, innocently believing that you don’t understand a word they’re saying. And being American means that when they actually do make the effort to communicate with you, anything they say has to be repeated to you at snail’s speed (in the same language) by your grandma, just to make sure that you can actually understand.

So sometimes, it’s best to keep the amount of people who know you’re American to a minimum.

Being American means that during break time, the girls in your piano class will rush over to you and trip over themselves as they ask you every little detail about what school in America is like (“Is math really easy?” “I heard you don’t get homework!”). Being American means that your piano teacher and sometimes even your uber driver will ask you to read random signs and labels in English (even when they have no clue as to what you’re saying) just because they’re fascinated with the way it sounds.

Being American means that your grandma will clap for you when you read aloud elementary-level Chinese words, and that everyone else on the street will stare and quietly wonder why a 5 foot-tall child is being applauded for being able to read the word “九” which means “nine” in Chinese. And being American means that every single one of your grandma’s friends is going to ask you to tutor their grandchild in English.

But sometimes, it's kind of nice.

Being American means that you can just browse and look around at Chinese shops and avoid a nagging sales lady’s attempts to follow you around and sell you random junk by speaking in rapid-fire English and pretending that you can’t understand a word she’s saying (might as well take advantage of this American stereotype).

And being American sets you apart. It means that you stand out.

And that’s not always a bad thing.

Of course, when I’m tired and grouchy, the last thing I want to do is volunteer in a screaming English classroom full of second-grade Chinese kids. But nevertheless, I’m kind of appreciative.

I like how eager those second-graders are to recite English lines after me. I like talking to my cousins about American culture, about shows like "The Walking Dead" and singers like Taylor Swift, and it’s kind of fun to make people do a double-take when I pass them on the street while speaking in a different language, and if it means that I have to pass through a few more clouds just for those bits of silver lining, then keep the clouds coming.