I used to live in the UK for 6.5 years. And most people who first met me would always have thought that I came from China, when I shake my head, "Korea? Japan? Philippines? ..." was what I usually was asked. I would say I come from Malaysia, though I'm the third generation there, my grandfather is from China. Chinese is my ethnicity, but Malaysia is my nationality.
I may explain further, say if I'm watching Olympics games and the Chinese is playing the Malaysians, I'd definitely support the Malaysians. When there's no Malaysian playing, I MAY support the Chinese. So in other words I see my nationality more importantly than my ethnicity, not forgetting the roots and values of my ancestors.
I went to Chinese kindergarden (2 years), Chinese primary school (Sekolah Jenis Kebangsaan, 6 years), Chinese secondary and high school (private, 6 years) in Malaysia. Then I left Malaysia for another 4 years undergraduate and postgraduate studies in the UK. I do grow up not having many non-Chinese friends, not understanding much about the non-Chinese cultures, having lots of stereotypes about the Malays and Indians (as a psychologist I'd say "stereotype" is a way of categorising, until it goes too far and leads to...). I can think of a few Malay friends I met from ELS Subang, and two Indian friends I have during my time in the Uni in UK (they are from Malaysia). Among all these girls and boys, 100% of them are kind and nice, the kind that I'd say can either be my moderate good friend or even good friends.
Until that day our PM calls it the "Chinese Tsunami", until the day Utusan Newspapers asks "Apa lagi Cina mau? (What else does Chinese want?)". I know Chinese Tsunami isn't true statistically and factually myself, but I don't know what I can do about that feelings of upset. You can't really defend especially when you think people have all thought that you are guilty. Till I start reading some status updates on facebook shared by friends. They are written by Malays, by Malaysians to be exact, defending this isn't chinese tsunami, explaining how LGE ended up in prison defending someone of not his race, saying DAP didn't win any seats from UMNO other than the one by LKS (so there isn't such saying that Chinese is taking over the country bla bla blah), praising how far Chinese has learnt that we can no longer rely and believe in BN, saying we are all just one family i.e. a Malaysian family, saying they would boycott some mainstream papers for trying to differential us as different races, showing pictures of people helping others of different races in BERSIH and 508BLACK etc etc etc.
I was wondering "were these Malays of majority?", maybe there were only like 5% of the urban Malays who think so?! I don't have Malay friends whom I can ask... As time passes, our so-called PM and some mainstream medias continue to give unjust racial comments which were upsetting, I started to see more and more non-Chinese raising their voices, including those from BN and some NGOs. I also spent some time reading the comments of those statuses defending for my race written by somebody non-my-race. The majority of the writers' friends agreed with them, though perhaps 5-10% didn't, and even scolded these writers for not defending their own religion, benefits, races and children etc.
So I learnt that they were probably majority, at least the majority of the urban Malays. OK, now stop saying Malays, Chinese, Indians, Ibans and whatsoever... Because of "him", we are more united as Malaysians. I probably wouldn't have realized this for a long long time without him... I remember way before the election day, I have myself said to an Indian tenant of my father's shop that "there are good and bad people in all races". Now I've confirmed myself after the election, that there are good chinese, good malays, good Indians, bad Malays, bad Indians, bad Chinese.. all the good ones should be united to defend the bad ones...
Though, I'm not saying that I've "removed" all my stereotypes about others, but I am going to try to accept that we all live, study, work, and do things differently (so some people work harder, some people lazier, some are more arrogant etc), as long as it's legal, I'm also going to try stopping these prejudice of other races, because for once I now know they would extend hands of help despite our ethnicity, and for once I'm hoping our next generation will grow up with far less prejudice and stereotype.
I may explain further, say if I'm watching Olympics games and the Chinese is playing the Malaysians, I'd definitely support the Malaysians. When there's no Malaysian playing, I MAY support the Chinese. So in other words I see my nationality more importantly than my ethnicity, not forgetting the roots and values of my ancestors.
I went to Chinese kindergarden (2 years), Chinese primary school (Sekolah Jenis Kebangsaan, 6 years), Chinese secondary and high school (private, 6 years) in Malaysia. Then I left Malaysia for another 4 years undergraduate and postgraduate studies in the UK. I do grow up not having many non-Chinese friends, not understanding much about the non-Chinese cultures, having lots of stereotypes about the Malays and Indians (as a psychologist I'd say "stereotype" is a way of categorising, until it goes too far and leads to...). I can think of a few Malay friends I met from ELS Subang, and two Indian friends I have during my time in the Uni in UK (they are from Malaysia). Among all these girls and boys, 100% of them are kind and nice, the kind that I'd say can either be my moderate good friend or even good friends.
Until that day our PM calls it the "Chinese Tsunami", until the day Utusan Newspapers asks "Apa lagi Cina mau? (What else does Chinese want?)". I know Chinese Tsunami isn't true statistically and factually myself, but I don't know what I can do about that feelings of upset. You can't really defend especially when you think people have all thought that you are guilty. Till I start reading some status updates on facebook shared by friends. They are written by Malays, by Malaysians to be exact, defending this isn't chinese tsunami, explaining how LGE ended up in prison defending someone of not his race, saying DAP didn't win any seats from UMNO other than the one by LKS (so there isn't such saying that Chinese is taking over the country bla bla blah), praising how far Chinese has learnt that we can no longer rely and believe in BN, saying we are all just one family i.e. a Malaysian family, saying they would boycott some mainstream papers for trying to differential us as different races, showing pictures of people helping others of different races in BERSIH and 508BLACK etc etc etc.
I was wondering "were these Malays of majority?", maybe there were only like 5% of the urban Malays who think so?! I don't have Malay friends whom I can ask... As time passes, our so-called PM and some mainstream medias continue to give unjust racial comments which were upsetting, I started to see more and more non-Chinese raising their voices, including those from BN and some NGOs. I also spent some time reading the comments of those statuses defending for my race written by somebody non-my-race. The majority of the writers' friends agreed with them, though perhaps 5-10% didn't, and even scolded these writers for not defending their own religion, benefits, races and children etc.
So I learnt that they were probably majority, at least the majority of the urban Malays. OK, now stop saying Malays, Chinese, Indians, Ibans and whatsoever... Because of "him", we are more united as Malaysians. I probably wouldn't have realized this for a long long time without him... I remember way before the election day, I have myself said to an Indian tenant of my father's shop that "there are good and bad people in all races". Now I've confirmed myself after the election, that there are good chinese, good malays, good Indians, bad Malays, bad Indians, bad Chinese.. all the good ones should be united to defend the bad ones...
Though, I'm not saying that I've "removed" all my stereotypes about others, but I am going to try to accept that we all live, study, work, and do things differently (so some people work harder, some people lazier, some are more arrogant etc), as long as it's legal, I'm also going to try stopping these prejudice of other races, because for once I now know they would extend hands of help despite our ethnicity, and for once I'm hoping our next generation will grow up with far less prejudice and stereotype.
