Woman in Canada tells grocer to "go back to China" for not being able to speak English

A Canadian woman has been filmed hurling insults at a grocery clerk at a Chinese grocery specialty store in Toronto, Canada.

In the video, the woman can be heard telling the grocers to "go back to China" several times, despites attempts from several bystanders to calm her down.

The reason behind her fury? The staff who were stationed at the food counter could not speak proper English and were unable to respond adequately to the woman's questions concerning the food.

"If they're going to work here, it's the law to know English," the woman said in the video. 

When told that not all of the staff could speak English properly, she then replied that "they should go back to China".

There were attempts from fellow customers to help the woman with translation, which she seemingly ignored. The video ends with another customer leaning over in an attempt to help the lady with her food choice.

Frank Hong, the man behind the camera stated in his Facebook post the reason for uploading the video.

"Racism and xenophobia isn't far from us nor has it gone away. As Canadians we think we are safe from these disgusting attitudes and behaviours but we aren't."

[embed]https://www.facebook.com/frank.hong.58/videos/vb.100002143442384/1402293249852110/[/embed]

The video which was posted on June 3 has since garnered more than 5,000 comments and 9,600 reactions on Facebook. On YouTube, the video has been viewed over 70,000 times.

Majority of the comments, as expected, have expressed anger and outrage at the unnamed woman's behaviour, with some pointing out that it is only logical that a Chinese store selling Chinese goods catered to those of Chinese ethnicity would have some staff who don't speak perfect English.

For the record, there is no such law in Canada which states that employees working in a private institute are to speak English. The closest instance of such a restriction would be the Official Languages Act, which applies only to federal institutions.

nicchew@sph.com.sg