Hong Kong-Thai-American in Mainland China

For most Americans, when they say "Asian" or even "Asian-American" they lump all of East Asia and South-east Asia together. However for me as someone with cultural heritage from both Thailand and Hong Kong I find it really important to tell people that I'm not just a Asian-American or even a Chinese-American, I am a Hong Kong-Thai- American. I've heard stories, whether from my co-workers in China or from CET, that Chinese-Americans are usually judged at a higher standard than most people. While this might be the case for others, I really didn't feel this was true. First, my name in English is "translated" from my Cantonese name, sounds that don't even exist in Mandarin, so whenever I introduce myself people, including the CET teachers, assumed I was Korean. I also have really dark skin so people assume that I have southeast Asian blood in me and therefore can't speak Mandarin either. For me, I was really lucky because I looked foreign enough where most people wouldn't judge me too harshly if I messed up, but at the same time I looked "Chinese" enough that people wouldn't feel like they should practice English with me.
In terms of how my background affected my Chinese learning in class, I'm really grateful for the teachers at CET. One thing I was really worried about is the fact that a lot of the words I know in Mandarin Chinese are more Southern/Taiwanese style Mandarin, but the head teacher, Qu laoshi, assured me that this wouldn't be a problem. Her reasoning is that as Chinese-Americans, we've grown up using that terminology and while that terminology isn't necessarily standard, it isn't incorrect either so she sees no need to force us to change that habit. I was also horrified that they would try to change the way I said the pinyin "sh" and "s"s. Once again I say it with a Southern accent. Actually at one point I did get into an argument with one of my teachers, but that argument quickly melted away as we continued the lesson. My other Chinese teacher said that as we are in the 300 level class, it is too late to change our accents. She thought it was more valuable to learn new grammar and words rather than to change something like grammar. I agree with this reasoning. The point of language is to communicate and I feel like no matter what accent you have, some one will always think you have an accent.
My Chinese teacher was also really good at telling me when I was using a Cantonese/Southern way of saying something rather than the Mandarin way of saying something. Rather than saying I was wrong, she would simply say that in the mainland they don't use that phrase/word and tell me what they use in the mainland. The teachers I've had in the past would straight-out say I was wrong so I'm grateful that the teachers in CET have a basic understanding of other dialects.