Racial Profiling, of sorts:
For those of you out in my reading audience who have kids who are obviously NOT your particular ethnicity (such as Mere for us) - have you ever had any problems with official ID checks, on the line of ‘this really your kid’, questioning their ‘real’ citizenship and family status, or worse? I’m talking about police pullovers on the road, checks at airports and the like.
For our own part, we made a big point of getting Mere a passport as soon as she became a citizen (February 2002) and have kept it updated since, and never go on any air travel without it. We’ve gone back and forth at the Canadian/US border with her several times, and never had any problems. So it’s not about us at all, but I’ve heard a couple of stories recently that made me ponder some peoples good sense and / or attitudes about non-whites in a white family.
I have pointed out to Meredith when the subject of her going back to China came up, and noted to her that when we flew to China, they give you a immigration form prior to landing; and one of the questions in there is to what your Chinese name is. I gave one to Susan and me, but it’s strictly unofficial, and I’d never use it on anything official like that - the Chinese authorities are not know for their sense of humor in such circumstances. But I imagine that Mere would have to fill that out with her Chinese name, because it is a matter of government record over there. (Of course, the number of Jiang Yu Cai’s out there with those exact characters may be small, but you never kjnow…)