Mistaken identity

[AmiU]

AIBU to have a little rant to MN, I'd feel too petty to say anything IRL.

I'm from an ethnic minority, living in a largely white area of London. Just yesterday, I had all of the following in one day:

• TA in DDs class sent (and often does) the other brown girl (OBG) out to me instead of my own DD.
• gym teacher regaled me with a story of how she wanted to date an Asian man on a dating app, but ended up dating an entirely different man by mistake, as they look 'the same, dark with beards'. She showed me pictures. They didn't look the same.
• kid from DD5's class cheerfully shouts 'bye, OBG's name' to my DD.
• a school mum says hi to me from time to time, but I don't know her and she calls me by a completely different Asian name. She even has names for DD and DS. Obviously, she thinks I'm a different Asian mum.

Obviously I know all these people are nice, friendly people and not racist in the slightest.

But there's nothing like it to make you feel like an alien in your own country, especially 4 times in one bloody day!

When I moved to an Asian country. Another of the company wives and I went to get our driving licences sorted. She's dark haired, dark eyes, tanned. I'm pastey White and ginger. The official looked at our photo IDs and said "which one is which?"... we were bemused.

Back in the UK I get mistaken for other gingers, even if we look nothing a like. People just see the ginger!

I think it can be assumptions about people too. The little girl DD gets mixed up with at nursery is a similar mix to her but looks nothing like her- to me, they still get their names the wrong way round. DD is the one who looks more British, other girl looks more Asian. DD has a name like Yukiko, other girl has a name like Millie. Either I'm just used to my child and they really can't tell them apart or people expect their names to be the other way round.

I also moved from Asia and couldn't tell all the blonds in my class apart for a while, so I probably can't talk!

I've read somewhere that the neurons in your brains make the necessary connections for visual and sound recognition in the first six months of your life, to enable you to recognise differences in the people you are surrounded by and also the sounds. The is why it's so difficult to get the finer nuances of a foreign language when you are older (esp things like tonal languages if you have not grown up with them) and also tell people from different races apart.

I don’t think it’s racist but I do think it’s totally unacceptable for a TA to get the names wrong. Speak to the teacher and head if necessary. I bet the children get the names wrong because the teachers are calling them the wrong names and if that’s the case then again it’s totally unacceptable. Even more so in London where even the white areas are really not that white so people should be used to different cultures. Pronouncing a name slightly wrong is acceptable to a point.

My name was pronounced wrong my whole life out of Asia until I westernised it as a teenager. DD's name is difficult to say as a non native and usually pronounced only slightly wrong even though they don't always get her name right My name is stupidly easy to pronounce but people insist on getting it wrong so I gave up

Thing is different races will not necessarily have the mapping in their mind to recognise differentiating facial features in different races, adding in non western names can then further complicate the name/face link. I think this is a well documented phenomenon. I’m more interested in the gym teacher showing you her on line dating position

That must be really tough OP. Four times in one day? You must have expected a camera crew from a prank show to jump out!
I'll confess I might have made this horrid mistake before. But then, I get my own children mixed up. I fear there is no hope for me...

There are two children I teach who I call the wrong name all the time.
They look nothing like each other. Their names aren’t similar. I just can’t get them straight in my head.

Totally not an excuse but the brain actually finds it much easier to see different features in people of its own race.

My Chinese friend got me and the other two blonde girls in our halls mixed up for a good month. I’m 5’4 and the other girl is 5’10 and he still got us mixed up ...

I've been told before that I should have given DD an English name. I still think that's crap, but the name/face link thing is interesting.

the brain actually finds it much easier to see different features in people of its own race

It's not your own race that you are good at recognising, but the race that you have spent the most time looking at.

I've seen this happen at a school between two parents and I had severe second hand embarrassment for them both! One mum was clearly mortified at her mistake and the Mum she'd said it to was very polite but you could feel the awkwardness.
Sorry this happened op!