# Can YOU Tell Asians Apart? **URL:** \ **Category:** In My Humble Opinion\ **Created:** [June 25, 2003, 2:44pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/can-you-tell-asians-apart/184299 "2003-06-25T14:44:38Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 12\ **Page:** 4
**Author:** ![Green\_Bean](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/green_bean/32/1760_2.png) [@Green\_Bean](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Green_Bean)\ **Post date:** [June 26, 2003, 12:44pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/can-you-tell-asians-apart/184299/61 "2003-06-26T12:44:41Z")
I got a 5. No matter. I’m _damn_ good at figuring out Asians’ backgrounds in real life–of course their names are a significant clue… ---
**Author:** ![dorkusmalorkusmafia](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/dorkusmalorkusmafia/32/7266_2.png) [@dorkusmalorkusmafia](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/dorkusmalorkusmafia)\ **Post date:** [June 26, 2003, 2:40pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/can-you-tell-asians-apart/184299/62 "2003-06-26T14:40:29Z")
I got a 7. All of the people I “knew for sure” I got right (5) and I guessed at most of the rest of them. China Guy said they were all Asian Americans. Did I miss something there? The people I got right were mostly based on their dress and/or hairstyles which I thought to be more directed towards their respective countries. However, many of the people had typical pop-culture clothes/hairstyles so with them I wasn’t really able to tell. ---
**Author:** ![Kn\_ckers](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/96bed5/32.png) [@Kn\_ckers](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Kn_ckers)\ **Post date:** [June 26, 2003, 3:07pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/can-you-tell-asians-apart/184299/63 "2003-06-26T15:07:20Z")
I did bady - I think I got 6 right. I’m white and haven’t had a lot of exposure to Asian communities, so that’s not a huge surprise. Since many other posters have said it’s very difficult to tell just from a snapshot, my humiliation is somewhat eased. And frankly, I don’t know why I SHOULD be able to tell where people are from, just by looking at them. People are people. We’re all different, and we’re all the same. ---
**Author:** ![SkipMagic](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/skipmagic/32/20706_2.png) [@SkipMagic](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/SkipMagic)\ **Post date:** [June 26, 2003, 3:37pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/can-you-tell-asians-apart/184299/64 "2003-06-26T15:37:31Z")
> [@](#): > > _Originally posted by Kn_ckers \* > \*\*I did bady… \*\* Who’s Bady? Is he Asian? More importantly, is he happy now? 😉 ---
**Author:** ![Kn\_ckers](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/96bed5/32.png) [@Kn\_ckers](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Kn_ckers)\ **Post date:** [June 26, 2003, 3:47pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/can-you-tell-asians-apart/184299/65 "2003-06-26T15:47:26Z")
Um. Oops. Badly. (He’s not Asian. But he’s thrilled 🙂 ). ---
**Author:** ![Space\_Vampire](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/e0b2c6/32.png) [@Space\_Vampire](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Space_Vampire)\ **Post date:** [June 26, 2003, 4:18pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/can-you-tell-asians-apart/184299/66 "2003-06-26T16:18:21Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by dorkusmalorkusmafia \* > \*\* The people I got right were mostly based on their dress and/or hairstyles which I thought to be more directed towards their respective countries. \*\* There’s the trick. I haven’t taken this test in forever, but if I recall there are a lot of “posers” in the bunch, making the test pretty hard. I don’t really care about the results of this test as I can generally identify the three groups in question very quickly and accurately in real life; the test has been “rigged” with atypical people, so that those who actually know what to look for may actually do worse than those who’re guessing. And the fact that a large number of them appear to be Americans complicates things further. ---
**Author:** ![elbows](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/b3f665/32.png) [@elbows](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/elbows)\ **Post date:** [June 26, 2003, 5:14pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/can-you-tell-asians-apart/184299/67 "2003-06-26T17:14:54Z")
A humiliating 8. And I’ve spent 10 + years travelling in SE Asia. I agree with Chinaboy, I think it’s a little skewed cause it’s AsianAmericans. I think I’d have done better if it had been AsianAsians. (?) When I was travelling in Asia the very first time, the most startling thing to me was to see a chinese guy who looked the splitting image of my brother (white boy). I still find it hilarious when I see an Asian who looks like someone I know, not Asian. But I swear it happens! ---
**Author:** ![Dogface](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/9d8465/32.png) [@Dogface](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Dogface)\ **Post date:** [June 26, 2003, 6:10pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/can-you-tell-asians-apart/184299/68 "2003-06-26T18:10:46Z")
That was my problem. (50% for me). For the most part, what I saw was, “Nope, that’s obviously Californian.” or “Looks like New Yorker to me.” There was the one woman who either came from or whose parents came from Guandong, but most looked American. ---
**Author:** ![mrsface](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/a9adbd/32.png) [@mrsface](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/mrsface)\ **Post date:** [June 26, 2003, 10:24pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/can-you-tell-asians-apart/184299/69 "2003-06-26T22:24:02Z")
I got a 4 - “hopeless”. At the risk of being a bad loser, I’m not really sure what this is supposed to prove. The website is called “[allookthesame.com](http://allookthesame.com)” , but the people in the photos don’t look the same at all, it’s just that some of us are unable to pinpoint their country of origin. So what? I’m white British, and I’m not sure if I would be able to do any better with a selection of photos from European countries. As someone else said, there’s far too much variation within ethnic groups to generalise about their appearance. ---
**Author:** ![Super\_Gnat](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/e274bd/32.png) [@Super\_Gnat](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Super_Gnat)\ **Post date:** [June 27, 2003, 5:21am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/can-you-tell-asians-apart/184299/70 "2003-06-27T05:21:43Z")
I got 11/18. A lot of that was guess-work though. I went to high school with quite a few Filipinos, so I think it would be easier for me to distinguish them from everyone else than telling apart Korean, Japanese, and Chinese. ---
**Author:** ![j.c](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/73ab20/32.png) [@j.c](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/j.c)\ **Post date:** [June 27, 2003, 7:33am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/can-you-tell-asians-apart/184299/71 "2003-06-27T07:33:30Z")
Why even bother to tell Asians apart? Aren’t Margaret Cho and Jackie Chan basically the same person, just eating noodles and sushi and talking their Engrish all day? Let the pandas eat them all, I say! ---
**Author:** ![divemaster](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/divemaster/32/78_2.png) [@divemaster](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/divemaster)\ **Post date:** [June 27, 2003, 12:33pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/can-you-tell-asians-apart/184299/72 "2003-06-27T12:33:18Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by China Guy \* > **Those of you that have never come to Asia but are around significant Asian populations in the US seem to nail the test.** Well, I _thought_ I would nail the test, but I only got a 6(!). I’m as white as they come, but my wife is Korean and we live in the DC area which has a large Asian population. Also, about 80% of my DVD collection are discs from HK, Japan, and Korea. I consider myself to have a good eye at distinguishing Asian nationalities. But a 6? Geez. My wife and I sometimes share a game together when we are out, trying to guess the nationalities of Asian passers-by. Of course, there is not much confirmation of the accurateness of our guesses, but sometimes language or cultural cues will tell us. And the thing is, I think we do VERY WELL at this! [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/can-you-tell-asians-apart/184299.md?page=3)