It's been five years since CC returned to China. But the Hong Kong-born, Oxford-educated returnee still hasn't succeeded in going native.
'Sometimes, coming back to China feels like time travel,' CC tells Niuniu over lunch at a Japanese restaurant. 'It's like living in Hong Kong 20 years ago. It's so hard to find people who are at my level, especially in regard to fashion sense.'
Like other returnees, one of CC's problems is that she's too far ahead of her time. In China, it's considered cool to carry a credit card, for instance, but CC has five or six. It's considered cool to drive a Buick, but CC was chauffeured in a Bentley as young girl. It's considered cool to drink Blue Mountain Coffee, but she's gone through her coffee-drinking phase and has moved on to green tea. It's considered cool to drop English words into your conversations even if your pronunciation is incorrect, but CC speaks fluent English. It's considered cool to know how to bowl, but she grew up playing golf with her parents. It's considered cool for middle-class women to discuss works of literature such as Jack Kerouac's On The Road and Allen Ginsberg's Howl, but she read them when she was a student.
'I can't stand people who bring their laptops to coffee shops to show off,' CC complains. 'Back at Oxford, everybody had a laptop. And, I can't stand people who show off their brand-name clothes that are at least two years behind New York and London fashions.'
Niuniu says: 'It sounds like those who think they are cutting-edge in China are actually out-dated by your standards.'
'Exactly,' CC says. 'I realise I'm so far ahead of everyone else with my New York-London style that I'm uncool in most eyes here. What I wear works on Madison Avenue, not here. It's not a matter of what one wears, it's where one wears it that counts. Just because someone looks good wearing something in Soho, doesn't mean it will be considered haute couture here.'