Why was I called ''Japanese'' at school by 2 random kids?

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When I was about 13, I suddenly got picked on by these 2 boys at my school, who were older than me and didn't know me and I didn't know them. They weren't being horrible as such, but were just getting on my nerves because each time I saw them (whether it was in school or just in the street) they always said, ''hi, Japanese!'' Whatever I tried to tell them, they never listened. I asked them why they were calling me Japanese exactly, but they just responded with, ''hi, Japanese!'' and I couldn't get an answer out of them, other than those two words.

I know this was, like, 10 years ago, and yes I have moved on, but it's one of those things I will never know the answer to. I do not even look remotely Japanese, or any Asian type. I am blonde, fair-haired, blue-eyed, and I don't have slanted eyes at all, I just look like a regular white British person, and my look was common so I didn't see how I was singled out among hundreds of other fair-haired students at the school. When I asked others if I looked Japanese, they always frowned in surprise and said, ''no way!'' So these 2 boys were the only people on this Earth who have ever called me Japanese. And it wasn't anything to do with the clothes I wore because we all had a school uniform and so all looked the same and so was impossible to be singled out based on how you dressed.

What confused me even more was I hung out with a girl who actually was half-Japanese, and also another blonde girl just like me, but they didn't pick on them. They never even acknowledged her, and always said ''Hi, Japanese'' to me whether I was with them or on my own. I just can't make it out, and was just wondering if anyone here knew of some sort of slang people use as ''Japanese'' to rip on somebody for they way the walked or the way they smelt or something. I never smelt of foreign food though because I never ate spicy/foreign foods, and I was always clean. So I don't know.....

Why don't you ask them?

Maybe it's your personality. Japanese culture places a value on shy, introverted people.

My guess -- and this really is conjecture -- is that it might have something to do with the racist myth that people from eastern Asia either have 'smiley faces' or 'don't show emotions'. If you presented as a somewhat stonefaced teen, that might've been it ...

... but I know people said plenty of weird / pointless things to me just to get a rise out of me, so who knows. *shrugs* Pubescent kids, especially when they're not on their own, are a cruel, vicious, unpredictable subgroup of human nature; one of the main reasons I don't want to have kids is that I don't want to be forced to deal with either school or school-aged children ever again.

I already said, I DID try to ask but they wouldn't say.

I think they were just trying to play mind games and confuse you.

I think probably that is the answer. I was so happy on my last day of school, so glad those days are over. This is why I wouldn't want to work at a secondary school, even doing something as simple as cleaning. I just don't like teenagers. I'd rather loud screamy toddlers running around me, than having teenagers picking on me.

Well, then ... why worry?

You may be giving them too much credit for coming to that conclusion. I think sometimes people (not just kids) like to throw random stuff out into the world to see how others react. They may have thought it was funny as in "Hey, lets always refer to this kid as Japanese, even though he is clearly not." It was most likely nothing personal. It is what I call treating the world as your personal prop. In other words, other people are here purely for their amusement. They are idiots. I believe some people grow out of it. Others remain idiots their whole life. It's sort of sad because they have no idea, no understanding, and they tend to think it's the world's problem for not getting their wit and humor (sarcasm off). I psychologist or sociologist probably has a better explanation.

I usually try to appreciate everyone for who they, but some people are just idiots.

I used to get called Spock on occasion and my ears aren't pointed at all.

Yeh, it can be weird how these people come out with these things. And then Aspies are the ones that are known to come out with stupid, irrelavent things....?

It's a bit like calling somebody skinny ''fatso''. I've never been made fun of my weight before in my life because I've always been slim, so it has never occurred for people to say anything about my weight.

In 3rd grade a boy in my parallel class called me slant-eye. I do not look oriental at all, I'm as white as it gets and my eyes are western looking. It has never bothered me, but like your case, it didn't make sense to me, and I thought him a bit of an idiot for it.

My only guess is that it was a random joke between them and by random I mean wayyy random. I can't name examples, but teens can starts some very random unrelated name calling in school and if you react, it sticks. I dunno. I got called gay in HS and I don't see anything personally about me that made me look homosexual, especially when it was well known in my small little school that I've had crushes on girls. Yeah, they knew who I had a crush on and my crushes knew it too. But I guess in that case it's different, because teenagers even now use that just as a general insult to people.

Now that I think about it there were a few guys in my elementary years that were older than me that called me "hero" for whatever reason. I don't know.

Anyway, it seems kind of funny that I saw and read this thread and a song called "In Tokyo" by Studio Killers started playing on grooveshark.

Edit: Btw, a friend next door is jokingly calling one of the kids that live there "Japanese." O.o She's not even close.