I *heart* stepfamily
This will be the last in my trilogy on racism.There is no point loitering on this topic too long..as I believe that some people are not worth grumbling over.I was going to reply to Otto's comments on my previous post…but its' too long and deserves its own post.
Now, I try not to blog about family too much here, as there is always a high possibility of them googling me and finding this…they know (sorta) that I have some sort of presence online, and had always asked for this site / my flickr site.
Once upon a time, Bacon's parents split up, and his father married another woman who have two daughters. After about 10 years , stepsister 1 now has a boyfriend, whose parents are actually Malaysian Chinese(surprise surprise). So you would think that it would be great for me fitting in since there is a pseudo Malaysian on the dinner table whenever we do one of them family dinners. Nothing could be further from the truth, and it came to a point where I so wanted to just stand on the table and scream at him.
Over easter dinner at the outlaws no. 1, the f-i-l cracked a joke that there is nothing wrong with the french - they are just so; foreign. And foreigners are strange. Me being the 'foreigner' on the table had to of course, grit my teeth and continue munching on my fatty lambchops. Hey, you can pick your friends, but not your family. Then the pseudo malaysian pipped up, " Yeah, they are just not english are they, I love their country, just don’t like them cause they are not english"
Now, what is wrong with the picture?
HELLO? Your parents are Malaysian, with chinese roots. SO ARE YOU, ya little wanker. And here he is, sitting there happily criticizing everything/anything non-English. And being typically cheena, I can't put it down to him being uneducated - typical of chinese parents, he's an accountant. And have shiploads of relatives from Malaysian visiting. And he'll make fun of the fact that Malaysian chinese have a chinese name and a 'fake' english name ( it is called part of our name ok!) , and happily asked me if my name was fake and what was my 'real' chinese name.
Hmm.
My mother is cleber can or not? She picked my chinese name via an english name can or not? Your mother never give you a chinese name that means your name is fake is it now?
………………………………………………………………………………………………………………….
I sometimes worry that my kids will grow up just like him, stupid, ignorant, and identifying with some segments of the british population, proceeded to insult his own parents.
Case in point no. 2. Now stepsister 2 is a spoilt little brat. She has not travelled anywhere other than Tenerife in Spain (which is more like Haadyai for people living in Penang or Singapore for people living down south) so that does not count. And this little prat…she used to come over all the time, and just sit there like a useless dummy. She'll tell Bacon off that he's not seen some of his friends ect - hello, we just got married we want to paint our bedroom can or not? My breaking point was when she came over one day and we were cooking tomyum bihun. She asked us what were them 'noodles' made out of, and I said it's rice noodle. She proceeded to comment that why everything in our house is made out of rice. I just looked at her and stated that same shit, different day, all you eat is potato anyway.
Then once she came over when I was hawking lunabliss jewelry. Right smack in the middle of December, and she was wearing stilettoes with no socks or stockings and complained that it was freezing.Seeing that its only 5min walk to my house, I told her that she can go back to my place and grab a pair of my new socks to keep her tootsies warm...yeah, I was trying to make nice since she was there keeping me company. Little prat replied, "No thank you, I don't do stuff like that. I'm BRITISH"
She don't come over as often anymore. Maybe it's because everytime she's here I will go for a long bath or watch tv up in my room. Oh, we will never know the answer.
posted by sourrain @ 9/22/2006 08:21:00 AM
12 Comments:
Oh man. Self-loathers are worse than the overt racists. Gees. That Malaysian guy - now he's what we'd call sia-suay. What a fucker.
sia-suey indeed. He was the person I least expected to be such an ignorant wanker.
This is why I vow to spend every christmas and easter overseas - if subjected to such idiotic remarks again, I might just lose it and tell them to fuck off in their dark hole.
I know some people wonder why don't I just tell them off - seeing that I am usually known as 'the fierce one' (dreybee will vouch for that). I love Bacon, and don't want him to be torn between his family and me.
I read your last 3 posts with a smile. I can soooooooo relate to what you say. But thankfully it's not within the family (bcos like I've said, everyone's well travelled). It's not even the close friends cos they are also relatively well travelled. Most have been to Asia and to KL specifically.
I think at the end of the day, it depends on your partner and your immediate family here. It helps if you are well supported and have people who 'defends' for you, without you having to open your mouth. And if all things fail, do like what Alex said ---> Don't ever go there again.
But I do agree with you on the "take holiday trips" thing...... I've been doing that, but for CNY back home. Just to escape the meddling relatives who come for a visit.
As for the accountant - well, he is an accountant. 'Nuff said. (oh god, Sourrain, I hope you are not an accountant too, less I insult the host).
Otto
ME IS ACCOUNTANT.
nah,just kidding:)
Before actually meeting all of them,I felt that it would be ok due to the fact that they already have a pseudo malaysian in the family. I think it's worse,because it is not so bad for them to misbehave, but for that accountant to act like a racist wanker was too much for me to take.
To be fair, most of Bacon's friends are not as ignorant as those that I had mentioned, and even made the effort to 'visit malaysia year 2006' for our wedding and absolutely love it there.
LOL. I remember that S.I.L #2. I will always remember the potato comment.
maybe thats why i collect mr potatohead figures!
i left another story out didn't i? the cousin-in-law and his mail order bride story...oh well, another time:))
Ouch! You are on a role this week. Maybe one misses Malaysia more than we think, lah? ( I know that is a Singaporean term....).
Living in Japan, where I am always an outsider, evn though I speak Japanese fairly well I can relate. As has been said elsewhere, Japan is the only club you can never join, no matter if you want to. You either are or you are not.
I see a lot of reverse racism with the S.O. from American women who wonder why she is with an American man...and why did said American man leave his model American family. Both of which are nothing the S.O. had anything to do with. I think it has to do with the fact that she is smarter and prettier than these hags..........(but I am biased).
Not sure what I am saying except aren't holidays with family fun. Come with back to my parents some time....after 4 days I'm crawling the walls. Hang in there.
ello Skippy! I was hoping you would add some MSG to this tasty trilogy topic seeing that you're in an opposite situation
Its true; Japan is a club that you can never join even if you own half of it - you are born into it.
My family drives me batty as well, but at least i don't have to deal with the other bits that goes with it.It doesn't help that I'm the wife of the black sheep of the family - the way he is sometimes treated by the outlaws is so outrageous.If my family dare treat me that way I'll probably disown them.
Anyway.We chose to live in a country that is not native to us, and adventures that we've had and will continue to have living in a foreign culture will continue to enrich our lives irregardless of the racism , reverse or otherwise, that we occasionally encounter
We really marry into a clan don't we? *sigh* You know the Chinese saying that Every household has a story that's difficult to read? (jia jia you ben nan nian de jin) It's so true.
lpc:The thing is, we were not warned before marrying into the clan.We find out all too late, when there is no way out:). What is your story lpc?I'm sure it has more than it's share of twists and turns!
family = dramas
Can't live with them, can't live without them.
dear dear sourrain, you and i both have step family issues! Ah well, heart your man, heart his family and all the idiosyncracities I suppose...
I am English and my wife is Spanish and we met in China and now are married in Hong Kong. Every culture thinks they are the best and have it right - people need to believe that to be happy. My family is quite laissez faire about international relations but my wife's family would, I think, gladly see me killed in a tragic bull-fighting acident so she could marry a Spaniard. They are of the 'coming over here, taking our jobs/women' brand of bigot I have found everywhere from HK, China, UK, Spain and I have no doubt Malaysia.
Bigotry doesn't have a colour. My wife is dark skinned and often in HK mistaken for a Filipina. She doesn't care when someone speaks to her in tagalog - she, and I, care when she is spoken down to and I would care the same had I fallen in love with a girl from Manila.
It is impossible to be colour blind - we all judge on the flimsiest of evidence at the blink of an eye. But we judge on what we are taught and that, exordinarily ordinary, is why I applaud your thought to your children's future.
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