Po An-you (second from the right) with friends outside the High Court of South Africa's Northern Gauteng region on the day he became a notary public.

The family - among today's 45 million overseas Chinese - hails from Wenzhou, Zhejiang province. Chan moved to the Netherlands at age 6 and soon saw himself as a child of his new country.

"I defined myself as Dutch but with Chinese parents and with a Chinese background," Chan, 40, says in a video call from Zwolle.

"I grew up in Holland, had Dutch friends. I did not know a lot about China."

At 18, his perspective turned 180 degrees.

That summer, Chan went on his first trip back to China with fellow Dutch-Chinese youngsters. He not only got a closer look at his birth country but also realized that he had more in common with overseas Chinese than with the locals. He began to seek out more Chinese friends when he returned home.

"We had the same upbringing and experiences in Holland, so there was an instant connection," says Chan, who now runs his parents' restaurant.

"From that point on, I regarded myself as a Chinese with Western influences."

Chinese immigrants like Victor Zheng, meanwhile, find it harder to define their cultural identities.

Zheng has spent the majority of his 37 years in Mexico and went to middle school in the United States, yet he continues to celebrate his birthday according to the lunar calendar. He speaks Spanish, English and Cantonese fluently, and has learned some Mandarin from watching Chinese TV programs.