Asians on Reality TV: The Amazing Race’s Cindy Chiang

By John | Wednesday, October 12, 2011 | 5 Comments

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As a fan of The Amazing Race, I was unfortunately traveling abroad for work in Shanghai and missed the premiere of the latest season a few weekends ago. In the past, the Amazing Race has done a terrific job of representing Asian Americans in the reality TV series, including:

I may be missing some contestants, as I have not watched every single season … This season, Cindy Chiang (a 30-year-old Brand Manager from Chicago) will be racing with her fiance, Ernie Halvorsen. And to kick off the season, The Amazing Race’s first destination was Taiwan.

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VanCityNights

In episode 1 she made a comment about “growing up Asian” and how Asian families are “super competitive environments.” You’d think for someone who came from a “super competitive environment” she could do a bit better than University of Cincinnati. No offense, but if she’s going to claim being raised in a stereotypical Asian upbringing, then at least have the positive stereotypical Asian results (Berekely, UCLA, something among the Top 50).

The cast this season isn’t very interesting. I’m a big fan of the show, the cast the season prior (the All-star one doesn’t count) with Kat & Nat, and Team QVC had way more charismatic contestants. Cast this season just isn’t very interesting.
aEnigma7345

@VanCityNights Well…she did go to Northwestern University for her MBA so I guess that makes it up for her attending Cincinnati undergraduate. She probably attended Northwestern in order to appease her super hardcore Asian Tiger parents, who were no doubt disappointed in her that she went to Cincinnati undergrad and felt she brought dishonor and shame to her Asian family…

A lot of Asians who went to crappy universities for their undergraduate often times go to top name schools for their master’s, MBAs, etc., to try to make it up for them attending a non-elite university during their undergraduate years.

For example, it was not uncommon for a lot of Asians from Rutgers to go to schools like NYU, Columbia, and the like to get their Masters of MBAs… Probably a lot of it has to do w/ either peer pressure or trying to make it up for letting their Tiger parents down… Or it could do w/ career advancement, cuz Asians face this thing called the “bamboo ceiling” in the workplace and it’s hard for Asians to breakthrough unless they have a big name university on their resume… It sucks cuz white people can go to mediocre schools and get managerial positions pretty easily whereas w/ Asians, it’s almost impossible for them to overcome the bamboo ceiling unless they have an MBA from a Top 5 or 10 university. That’s how bad Asians got it and why Asians are so obsessed with going to big name universities. The obsession stems from a combination of Asian culture, peer pressure, Asian parents, and the bamboo ceiling.
aEnigma7345

@VanCityNights Don’t worry, she got her MBA from Northwestern University (an Asian-approved “big name” school) so she’s a proper, model minority Asian after all. After all, she’s not a “real” asian unless she went to a prestigious university, right?

Gimme a friggin’ break here, she’s a brand manager. You don’t need a friggin’ MBA from Northwestern U to be a brand manager. i have lots of female friends (all Caucasian, Black, or Hispanic) who have the same job as her and all they have are just Bachelor degrees from state schools. Sure, a few do get MBAs, but those are mostly at local schools, not schools like Northwestern.

She probably got the MBA from Northwestern to appease all the people she felt she disappointed by attending a “subpar” university for undergrad.
LuckySchwartz

I find her highly annoying
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