Hi, Recently, I've been reading a lot of posts on blind. All of these great guys, that make plenty of money, in the valley or Seattle, that are depressed because they're single. I wanted to share my story, and hope many of you will make the same decision as me. I used to work at Microsoft in a good finance role. I went to Microsoft post bschool. Great job. Good pay. Stock rising. Got promoted. All good from career. But, I'm Asian American. 5'9 / 5'10. I was 32 at the time. Single. I have a underbite that can't be corrected without very invasive surgery, which is quite noticeable. I'm a little overweight for an Asian American, but working on that. I'm not particularly athletic. I have a slight stutter. From an American perspective, this is not an ideal external profile. Think of it this way < 1% right swipes for me. While I think I have a good personality, in Seattle, I sorta felt like a loser. I had / have a few close Asian American friends and went to a good church, which was super helpful, but everyday I felt like I was drifting by. I loved my job, but my personal life wasn't great. If I'm completely honest, having women like me either platonic / romantically is a very important part of my life. I believe it's an important part of most men's life. That's never been the case for me. I have a feeling that's the same for many Asian American men here. So I was going to Asia for work a lot and whenever I went, I was like, wow, this is amazing. I have a few friends from bschool that lived here and they were so great to me. I decided I really wanted to make the move. 1. Good Total Comp. Same or equal to Microsoft. 2. Live in the city center 3. Work on something I enjoy Grace of God, I received an offer that met those requirements. So I moved to Asia. In Asia, I don't feel like a loser. I have a group of great Asian American / Asian Canadian / Asian European friends that are like me that too has made the difference. I have a loving and caring girlfriend that has made my Christmas incredible. I have been blessed with a great group of friends. We play board games / go out / have gatherings regularly throughout the week. I play in a bball league and i'm not good at basketball, but it's fun. For those of you that are feeling low in the US. I understand. I don't want to uproot your lives. I don't want to tell you that Asia is better. That's not my place. I just want to offer an alternative. I know what it's like to be an Asian American in the US, where data shows that Asian men for many nuanced reasons, tend to only liked by Asian women and about 50% of Asian women, probably still prefer non Asian men. Being liked also plays a huge part when it comes to charisma. People like to be around people that have charisma, and if society views the people group as sort of an outside group, then it's hard to have charisma. It's not about racism, just Asian Americans in the US aren't considered American really, and so that affects a lot of aspects of our life in ways that are different than other minority groups and in a way that white people probably can't understand / don't understand / don't want to understand. I understand a lot to unpack there. Happy to go into more detail / analysis. Just something true about the United States. I understand there are some underlying assumptions that some people / many people may disagree with me here. Let's discuss if you'd like. Happy to share data as well. I have a dream that no Asian American will ever feel out of place again, if I can help, I will. I've helped five people as part of their move to Asia. They are really happy. They make same or a little less than they did in the US. I don't want anyone to ever feel the way I did. In the US, I probably could be making ~300K including stock appreciation. In the bay / seattle you will probably like your job more as I have found working with Americans is easier than working with Asians I would say as a whole in general. I know I'm generalizing a lot. I know a lot of Asian American men that are much happier in Asia than in the US. I don't know that many Asian American men that are happier in the US than in Asia. If you can get in a situation where you can be based here but work on a global team, I say do it. Personal life is really important and anyone that has thought about moving to Asia, please PM me. I promise to help you if I can. TC: ~200K Edit 1 - Thanks for the responses! I've received a ton of PMs. Most asked questions are: 1. How do you get started? 2. Will they sponsor your visa 1. How you get started is changing your linkedin location to the location you want to be based. Be PATIENT. I spent a year planning my move. DO NOT SETTLE for a job that is a demotion. Lateral at worst or upward trajectory is what you are looking for. 2. YES! They will sponsor your visa. Any country in Asia is happy to find someone with your skills to contribute to the economy. Edit 2 - Hi Everyone, thanks so much for your comments. I'm really sorry that a portion of the thread devolved into just dating. It wasn't supposed to. My meta point was that how people perceive you is very important. I'm popular in Asia. I have a lot of friends. I'm invited to things. I'm eloquent. I'm confident. Girls like you. Female colleagues admire me. They want to learn more about me. Guys want to be connected with me. People proactively reach out to me. I'm the same person as the US. In the US, I didn't have a lot of friends. I wasn't invited to things. My eloquence is translated as someone that's too opinionated. My confidence into what people perceive as arrogance. For people that think this is a confidence problem, anyone knows me knows that I'm not unconfident. It's not that. It's not that I didn't try. Aggressive attempts at women in the US are interpreted as creepy. This is a Me Too Age. A generalization that I believe in is that an unattractive guy that attempts to court a woman, is considered creepy. A good looking guy is considered romantic. I've literally done and said the same things to women. In the US - she literally told my boss she thought I was creepy because she knew my boss from a wine tasting class or something. In Asia - she said yes and asked why I didn't ask earlier. Same words. Same tone. Same syntax. Only things that were different are different girl and different location. That is what changed people here and the US. Edit 3: I was born in the United States. Grew up in New York and California. Edit 4: I am so happy to have received so many comments and messages. I've received 50+ messages asking for help and questions. I'm here to help all of you. If moving to Asia can help your life, let's figure this out. You've made the first step. If I can ask all of you to first change your location on your linkedin to the location you want to be based. This is the first step. COVID obviously changes things but finding the job and moving, the process will take about a year, but you can do it.
Where in Asia?
I’ve lived in a number of places now. Shanghai, Beijing and Singapore. All have been great. Similar experience. I feel like Chinese people tend to like Americans more than Singaporeans. Whereas Singapore might be slightly better for those with more of a European background. I speak chinglish so maybe that helps with China.
Interesting. Chinese who goes to church. Are you Taiwanese?
What company and location?
Looks like he is with Amazon. Now the more important stuff - does Amazon PIP less in Asia and is there a smaller chance of you getting. CTO zone’ed (refer to another popular and hilarious post that is currently trending here)
Thank you for sharing, provides a good perspective for many
I'd only challenge the claim that 50% of asian women prefer non-asians. Seems like quite the opposite, most of them prefer asian men, or are even more specific to their own country of origin.
I preferred Asian men or Chinese speaking men in particular, always thought I’d date an Asian guy, but I ended up with a white dude. I didn’t have a lot of experience dating and growing up my family always said guys should make the first move otherwise you may seem unworthy to your partner (now I realize it’s probably not true?), but no Asian guys ever asked me out or maybe I was really bad at reading signs and didn’t pick up subtle hints. Whereas my now boyfriend made it pretty obvious he was into me. Asian women always get the reputation of hating their own race or whatever, I don’t, I spend a lot of time and effort learning about traditional Chinese art and literature, I don’t know how many other asian women out there are like me 🤷♀️
Very interesting. I haven’t had that experience in Seattle. Maybe the range could be 30-50. I would wager at least 30. As high as 50+. My experience is that East Asian women tend to be more open to date out of Asian than south Asian. I actually have not met a single Japanese American woman that dated a Japanese American man and very few that are dating Asian / Asian American. Chinese women and Chinese American women tend are 50/50 with Chinese American women probably higher than that. (Priscilla Chan’s of the world) Korean and Korean American women tend to probably prefer Korean / Korean American men. Southeast Asian women probably are very heavily skewed toward preferring non Asian men. South Asian/Desi women prefer south Asian/ Desi men
Hey man, Really appreciate you writing this and am glad that you have found your happiness. Having lived in Asia myself for some time and now back in the states working in SF (pre-pandemic, now remote), your piece definitely resonates- it’s definitely a night and day difference. That said though, to play devil’s advocate, when viewed from another angle, the solution you’re proposing may arguably be a bit of a cop out. Look it’s tough to date as a below-average to average Asian male (I know this from personal experience), but things are also not going to get better until more people try harder here in the states, as tough as things may be. I’m optimistic that as more Asian dudes work on their game, improve their charisma, and just become all-around better men, things will get better. Believe me, (covid aside) I’d love to move to Asia and have a far easier dating life, but I’ve actively made the choice to stick it out. And I think that though it may seem like the path of greatest resistance, other Asian dudes would benefit from doing the same- if not just for the potential character building benefits. Again, I realize that everyone’s situation is unique and I’m genuinely happy for you that moving to Asia seems to have worked out in your case. But just respectfully presenting an alternative perspective :)
Thank you for this perspective. I really agree with you and I think yours is the better long term perspective. I think your perspective will probably take 10-15 years to really have a palpable effect on society. I think men are only young and can date once. I also think there are more and more high charisma, good looking asian men in the US which is great and things will be better for when my nephew is ready to date in 12 years. I agree there are character building aspects of having a tougher game to compete in. I just view it as somewhat unnecessary. If there's an option to have an easier game, maybe the camp I'm arguing for is life is short, why fight uphill battles when you don't 100% need to. Maybe a cop out, but this is perhaps a way for some people to work smarter, not harder. Maybe I'm pessimistic, but I just have a hard time seeing an Asian american guy being as popular as a football jock in the US. Someone that everyone naturally gravitates towards. I think Andrew Yang is probably the #1 Asian American in the US right now in terms of prominence and maybe Sung Kang / John Cho / Jimmy O Yang, are the most prominent Asian American male actors. I don't feel like any of them have a super mainstream following. Love the alternative perspective. I agree with you that - there are far better men than me fighting the good fight everyday. High Five.
I am Asian American, naturally introverted/shy, and previously suffered from internalized racism (I grew up in a town population of <1% Asian), but grew out of it. I was popular in high school but it took hard work to be funny and social. Charisma comes once you can become naturally funny and social. I didn’t seek to be charismatic. I just sought to connect with people - that’s how charisma comes about. I also believe that I would have an amazing life in Asia. My Asian American girlfriend and i talk about working out of SG/TPE/Tokyo for a few years to experience it. But it’s not because we are looking for an easier life. I dealt with racism my whole life in my small white town, but it hardened me and made me want to combat it more as I grew up. With all respect, I agree that OP sees this as a cop out, but I also see the perspective that life is short and we should do our best to maximize happiness. Moving to Asia is a shortcut to that, but my ultimate point is that anybody can work on “being liked”. Let me stress again that I am insanely introverted, to the point that I have gone to therapy to help with speaking up at meetings (bc I am Asian and always felt inferior to a room full of white men). But socially, I have found comfort in being myself and being able to wear a natural smile on my face. Your happiness will become a gravitational force for others to want to be friends with you.
Do you speak English abroad? Isnt it a big issue to be Asian but can't speak the native language where you are staying?
Yes, I speak English abroad. If you're worried about language, try Singapore, HK, Bangkok or KL.
Right, but do you just hang around with expats? As in if you're Chinese but can't speak Cantonese in HK, it'll be hard to make friends.
Good Advice! I'm not an Asian man, but am a minority who was born and raised in North America. This is an excellent post. https://www.financialsamurai.com/dear-minorities-use-racism-as-motivation-for-achieving-financial-independence/ There is no sense denying the systemically racist society we live in.
The systemically racist society that has Asian men and women making more than white men?
I’d definitely move to Asia if I weren’t gay + cared about marriage
Omg same
Taiwan has marriage equality.
This is so wholesome
I’m happy that OP found love and a new life abroad, but I feel like this post isn’t wholesome. It sounds like a man who blamed his problems mostly on not finding a compatible life partner, and his reason for not being able to do so was his appearance (underbite, not athletic, Asian), but still has a “good” personality. I’m also Asian-American. I used to have trouble finding peoples to date and was not confident. Then I decided to invest in myself (more hobbies, taking care of skin, working out, treating women like people), and turns out, dating doesn’t require everyone in the country to look like you to be successful. People will date you if you are confident/comfortable with yourself. I also hate the narrative that only 50% of Asian women prefer Asian men. Pretty sure that number comes from an okcupid article a million years ago. I think it was like, the average Asian man would receive responses from like 22% of all women (not just Asian) he matched with and was the lowest response rate among most ethnicities. White men had the highest at 29%. That’s a difference of 7%. Statistically, this will not cripple your dating life.
As a woman, I disagree. I worked in a predominantly white company, where white males would openly joke/disparage Asian men. Also commonly expressed among some female friends is the perception of Asian men to be effeminate and hence unattractive. I don't condone this, but I am simply stating observations.