17-1-13 【精短听访】我从肯尼亚来，中国是我家—我是“第三文化小孩”

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China is my  home. Kenya is my home

Nillah Nyakoa, from Kenya, is ajournalist and broadcaster with CRI, regularly spreading her knowledge andenthusiasm of China to listeners around the world.

Nillah is increasinglyfascinated with the culture and background of China. She explains how localsfind it also fascinating that she is not here on business or as a student - butthat she is working here. She talks also of other Africans doing very interestingwork here.

Nillah hopes to spend more timein China. She now calls herself a 'Third Culture Kid' - because having beenbrought up in Kenya she now sees Beijing as home! However, this desire fortravel and to discover more of the world means she has no feeling of apermanent address. For Bruce Beijing has been home for many years - somethingthat locals again can find fascinating, about why foreigners actually want tocome to live here and stay for many years.

China is my home. Kenya is myhome

Track one

A lot of people, when I meetthem here – the first question is:

“What school do you go to?”

I am not a student.

Ok what do you do? I work

They say “Oh, you don’t dobusiness?” “No!”

So you came to China to Chinato study and then you found your job?

“No. I came from Kenya to Chinafor a job”.

They go – “Oh that’sinteresting. Very strange.”

Sometimes the conversation endsthere.

You get to realise that a lotof people don’t know there are a lot of African people here, who I have met,who are doing so many different things.

Some in fashion, modelling,teaching – doing so many different things

But the fact that wepredominately have diplomats and students here

It kind of lets people havethis kind of preconceived ideas about Africans in China

A lot of people think she mustbe a student, or a diplomat or just somebody visiting to buy stuff.

Having been here this long Inow see myself as a ‘third culture kid’

Kenya is home, China is home.

I do not have a permanentaddress yet – where I would say I want to retire

I am a kind of person who isinterested in travelling

So I am taking this opportunitywhile I am in China

This is my time to travel Asia,to get to know different cultures, especially in Southeast Asia

And so after China I do notknow what is going to happen

But, for now, all I know isthat this is my home.

And Kenya is my home as well.

But I still have to figure outwhat is going to happen in the future

As I still think I am quite young- so I still have time to decide what I want to do

Questions

What do people in China oftenfind strange about Nillah?.

What do many people thinkAfricans in China do?

Why does she say she is a ‘ThirdCulture Kid’?

What does Nillah love doing?

Which countries does she planto visit?

Track two

The only worries I have aboutstaying here permanently is things like pollution

Everything else love it!

Chinese people find it a bitstrange that westerners want to come to live here

It also depends on what kind ofwesterners or foreigners they are talking to

Chinese people are fascinatedwith black people

For most of them it is thefirst time they have come into contact

And ask so many questions like“Where are you from?” – especially the taxi drivers.

Beijing – and they go“Impossible”!!

But I live here – this is myhome – No, no,no!!

You are ‘meiguoren’? – No I amnot an American I am from Africa

“Oh, I see. So which part ofAfrica?” “Kenya”

“So you run a lot?”

“Yes in the gym!!”

It is very fascinating abouthow they react to us foreigners

I have got a friend from Gabon,Luke Benza.

He is an actor, a martial artsperson.

He has been here for over 30years. Every time I meet him I still cannot believe he has been here for 30years.

Right now, me being black andAfrican is so fascinating.

I can only imagine coming at 14and going to the Shaolin Temple for a year and a half

What it must have been like forhim.

After China and Africa starteddoing business – right now if you went to Africa there are so many Chinesepeople

In Kenya on the streets you seea Chinese person hawking phones, selling things on the street

And then you find Chineserestaurants just mushrooming and buildings cropping up with Chinese writings onthem

And all the ConfuciusInstitutes.

Questions

What do Chinese people findstrange?

Where do people often thinkNillah is from?

When they discover Kenya whatdo they think?

What does her friend from Gabondo in China?

What do we now see on thestreets of African cities?.