All Gaijins Look the Same

This is such a hilarious statement of reversed roles that I practically snorted when I heard it.

But this is true enough. I have talked to several Japanese people about it and whereas some seem to think along the lines of 'pffft that is ridiculous', others who have less interactions with us gaijins profess its truth. Indeed it is a true opinion of some people in Asia. I asked my Korean co-teacher the same question and she said of course not! We were all so different! My South-African co-teacher at the same school and I both had blonde hair and fair skin. She has bright sky blue eyes and mine are green. She is also perhaps six inches taller. And though my Korean teacher said this, she would very often get us mixed up for one another in the classes.

I must admit, to myself it sounds like the strangest thing. We have different colors of eyes and hair and even different colors of skin, pale, olive, tan. And yet perhaps to them maybe it isn't that we all look the same but that we are unrecognizable to them in any unfamiliar setting. Perhaps it is really not that they cannot recognize us apart from on another but that the possibilities are so great that we could easily be someone else they refuse to recognize us for who we are. Or then again we all really do look alike and I just completely am missing it.
It is interesting to see our roles in reverse. Where in America, less cultured people will always tell you how Asians all look the same. And indeed, not that I couldn't tell people apart, but their hair color and style, as well as their skin color, and sometimes height are largely similar and therefore from a distance you might easily mistake them for someone else.
But now living in Korea and Japan I see the differences more clearly than ever before. Their faces are all so different to me as different breeds of dogs are to a dog lover. Their jaw lines. Their complexion. Their hair. The shape of their eyes (YES IT'S DIFFERENT). Perhaps it is not as drastic as blonde and browns of the hair color of western cultures, but I suppose when you live here long enough you see that there is different quality to each persons hair or their facial features are excessively prominent that how could you possibly mistake them for anyone other than themselves?