I can relate. I'm one of three non-Chinese employees in a Chinese-owned company in California. Like your office, my coworkers converse predominantly in Chinese. I take no offense to this whatsoever, and in fact have begun taking Mandarin courses so I can better understand my coworkers.
I'll admit there is a small part of me that gets slightly irritated every time we go through a hiring cycle and everyone who shows up for the interviews is Mandarin speaking Chinese-- because it cant be that only Chinese people are applying for these jobs; the odds don't favor it.
That said, I love my job, I get along with everyone at work, and actually feel like its a great opportunity to learn about another culture up close without having to travel across the world like the parent poster.
I guess the point is anyone (white, black, asian, etc.) can be culturally isolated in any country or company. Some people have an easier time assimilating, and other still don't ever feel the need to assimilate.
It makes me wonder if there is something unique about "white" culture that causes "others" to feel more isolated than when the reverse scenario is true. I've never worked for a man, and have never worked for a white guy, yet I'm a white guy myself. Beyond the slight irritation i mentioned above about hiring, its never bother me a bit.
But with this case, you have a large linguistic barrier that goes both ways. The experience is only partially simulated compared the article author's experience, because she did not have any linguistic barriers.
I experienced the 1st generation chinese/russian linguistic barrier myself too. I think the big reason why is because there is an engineer shortage, or science grad student 'shortage', so many candidates are going to come from their social networks, which are probably mostly russian or chinese. They themselves don't feel comfortable with the external language and culture, so they associate with people they feel more comfortable speaking with and it self perpetuates. It only goes away when their children are born in the next generation, or they are isolated enough that they are forced to integrate.
Conversely, you may simply feel "isolated" all the time and not realize it.
The author of this article describes a sense of collectivism when she moved to Oakland. For whatever reason, she views black people as more "like her" than others and enjoys the resulting tribalist feelings. Take that away and she feels something is missing.
I too am the odd man out - obvious foreigner in India. I do not get to enjoy feelings of tribalism. But I don't feel different than in the us - stick me in a room full of lower middle class Americans and I'm still not enjoying any particular sense of belonging. They aren't "my people", they are just people. I never get to enjoy these positive feelings of tribalism.
>I'll admit there is a small part of me that gets slightly irritated every time we go through a hiring cycle and everyone who shows up for the interviews is Mandarin speaking Chinese
It depends, some of those firms offer comparatively low salaries to Americans and can positively exploit their own people (same ethnicity as company founders).
So at least for some companies with HQs in CN or TW, it's not surprising that you'd see few Americans --of those you see some are resurrecting their careers --so they'll take the cut.
I'll admit there is a small part of me that gets slightly irritated every time we go through a hiring cycle and everyone who shows up for the interviews is Mandarin speaking Chinese-- because it cant be that only Chinese people are applying for these jobs; the odds don't favor it.
That said, I love my job, I get along with everyone at work, and actually feel like its a great opportunity to learn about another culture up close without having to travel across the world like the parent poster.
I guess the point is anyone (white, black, asian, etc.) can be culturally isolated in any country or company. Some people have an easier time assimilating, and other still don't ever feel the need to assimilate.
It makes me wonder if there is something unique about "white" culture that causes "others" to feel more isolated than when the reverse scenario is true. I've never worked for a man, and have never worked for a white guy, yet I'm a white guy myself. Beyond the slight irritation i mentioned above about hiring, its never bother me a bit.