I think somewhere almost to the near end of Primary 3, my mom and I were going back to Taiwan for the hols. It was fun, though the biting cold of winter was no joke. I remember on the second day of me being in Taiwan, I actually spent the whole afternoon with my maternal grandpa, taking very long walks in the nearby park and chatted about stuff, and only came home almost near dark and my mom and grandma jokingly saying that if we took any longer, they'd call for a search party.
Being around people was nice, because it would act as a shield for me from being demonized by my mom (because I knew of all things, she treasured face-value and reputation above anything else), but of course, in private, my mom would still whack the socks off me and told me to shut up.
Personally I WANT her to beat me in front of everyone so that they will see what her true nature is, but it's wishful thinking.
I thought this time it would be a routine holiday where it would be instead of spending it with the holiday foster family. But then, I found myself being taken to many different important buildings by my mom and either along with my grandparents or my youngest aunt, and my memories of that time consist of walking past many odd, tall-looking cubicles and then into an office where a lady would be talking to my mom and my aunt or my grandparents on things while typing certain letters. Then after that I was taken to a primary school where they had a long chat with a teacher about me starting classes and I had a feeling at that age of mindset that I would probably have to stay longer than I should (which later on, when I was older, I realized that I was unknowingly put in there as foreign exchange student).
As I predicted, I stirred early in the morning at almost dawn to hear my mom talking to my grandparents. I couldn't hear what they said because I was trying to pretend to sleep and hear their hushed voices at the same time, but I could tell that my mom was dumping me off again to live with someone else while she disappears doing god knows what. So I wasn't too upset to know that she was leaving, because both her and my dad had done this to me so many times already that it was old school for me.
When I woke up in the morning and asked casually where my mom is, my grandparents looked worried at first when they told me that she had left and that I will be staying with them for some time, then I surprised them by taking it casually with a "Oh, OK" word and left it at that when they were expecting me to behave like any kid who would be upset and crying over their mothers disappearing on them.
They should know by now that I am not like other kids.
Studying in a Taiwanese school with a syllabus totally different than Malaysian style was a little tough for me. For starters, being raised in Malaysia and having a healthy appetite, I was the tallest among all my minute classmates. I remember perfectly what my class was called: Class 3-5. When I came in to introduce myself, they were all looking up at me as if I was a giant. I was the centre of attention for a while, as when break time started, the girls were pulling me while the boys were pushing downstairs to the playground, all trying to get to know me.
I was still a little bit of a Malaysian Chinese dialect back then, so it was a little awkward for me to communicate with them, but I more or less got the hang of it. And then the students themselves were probably way advanced than I was, being that they learn tons of things that doesn't even exist in Malaysian syllabus, like Science, for example, and Social Studies, which for them it's a mix of geography and Moral Education, so I think I was often called "stupid" behind my back. Well, I can't help it for being raised in a backwater country. And boy, do they have a foul-mouth, knowing how to curse and swear and speak taboo words that even friends my age back home would never dare utter.
Their school days style was like this: Mondays, Wednesdays and Fridays is a full-day study, while Tuesdays, Thursdays and Saturdays (yes, we actually have school on Saturdays) is a half-day study, and we have to wear alternate uniforms on those days (we get two different uniforms where one is worn on the full-days and the other worn on the half-days--personally I like the one worn on half-days best because they have a very nice dark blue coat, unlike the screaming orange for full-days), and on Saturdays, we get to wear whatever we want, so I always look forward to Saturdays where I can show off my pretty dresses.
Every period, we get a 10-minutes break time to play at the playground downstairs (which I bloody wish they had it back in Malaysia), and on full-days, we get an hour and half lunch break which we eat either from getting lunches from our parents who wait outside the gate (which my grandpa always does) or from the lunch bento-s from the school canteen (which you have to purchase a weekly coupon and give one everyday to get it). My youngest aunt helped me pay for a whole semester's worth of lunch bento to ease my grandparents' burden (see why I love her so much?), which entitled me to just show up without a coupon and get bento without having to fight with the crowd, and I was famous among the canteen staff for always being their regular customer for frozen Vitagen despite the biting winter (frozen Vitagen seems to taste better and last longer than liquid ones).
After lunch break (on full-days), we get about an hour long naptime before classes resume as per normal, which I kind of hate, because if I take naps, I can't sleep at night, so I just faked sleep by covering my head with the coat and do my drawings underneath, and always try to hold back from laughing because we actually have a snorer in class (seriously! She bloody snores in class during nap time!).
What I remember having learnt in their syllabus would be the National Language, Art, Music, Science and Social Studies. They also have classes like Calligraphy Writing in which I think I totally sucked at because I was always getting red marks from a very traditional, old school teacher. Calligraphy is part of the elective syllabus in which if the students wish to pursue a more in-depth study of it, they will have to go to his office which is in another building situated somewhere near the school gates where you get to sit in those really traditional Chinese seating with the sliding door and all the whatnot. I've been there once, on the last day of my studies, and that was the first and last time I've ever been in there.
They also have a rotation system in which everyone gets to be the class monitor for a week, which was awesome, because I had the chance to be in control of the classroom and bear the responsibility of leadership and telling everyone to stand up and greet the teacher before class started, and it is the time where I don’t have to take naps but write down names of people who don’t take naps, meaning I hold the key of every of my classmate’s “life and death”. It was also the first time I actually learn Science in class when it is not part of the syllabus for Malaysia, and I remember one of our science project was to rear a bunch of silk worms to see its process from a larva to a moth, and it was an amazing experience when we set the moths free after that at the end of the project.
I remember that because they have a different way of using phonetics in reading Chinese than the classic pin-ying that Malaysian Chinese use, I was at a disadvantage because I didn’t know how to read the tougher words, only the basic ones, and of course, their Chinese is not the simplified Chinese, but the traditional Chinese with bloody more strokes than the regular simplified Chinese. The teacher saw my predicament and for about 2, 3 months, I was exempted from naps to be given special lessons to learn Taiwan phonetics.
At first she requested my classmates to teach me, exempting them from naps as well, but I always end up getting distracted and chat with them instead of learning, so she decided I should be with a really very nice teacher at a rec room next to the library. She would teach me how to properly read, write and pronounce the phonetics and at every end of the lesson, she would allow me to pick a book for her to read for me and for me to learn to read as well, just to improve my skills. I remember there was a set of children's series starring this very cute little kitten and his daily life escapades with his furry friends, and I always pick from that series.
During my days learning with her, I had the time of my life. During naps, I would quickly scurry away from class and run all the way towards the direction of the rec room where she would be waiting. I admire her dedication to forgo relaxing time to pay attention to me, and I owe her a lot for that. Sometimes when I wait for her to arrive (if I was early) I would eye at the cupboard to see really nice colouring pencils and pens and there was one very nice one that I have been eyeing forever: a colouring marker set that has a very beautiful picture of the character Candy from the old school anime Candy Candy. During the last days of my phonetics tuition with the teacher, she said I could pick anything from the cupboard as a graduation gift, and that was my inspiration to excel the phonetics test. I passed with flying colours and finally got what I was yearning for, although a scatterbrain like me ended up losing the yellow colour barely a week after I got it.
My dad somehow figured out where I was and would call to talk to me once in a blue moon, in which sometimes my grandma would make me pass the phone to her so that she could scold my dad for being a good-for-nothing bastard who bullied her daughter and squandered their money (apparently at one point, my dad actually borrowed money from my grandparents to cover his debts but never paid back), but all in all, at least he called, to check on me and see how I was doing. My mom, on the other hand, literally dropped out of the face of the earth. She never called, never wrote, and never even left any form of contact so that we could find her to see how she was doing. None. I never heard a single word from her since the day she left.
In time, I almost totally forgot that I used to have a life in Malaysia. I go to school, study, come home and have my usual meals with my grandparents (watching their funny antics in the process, especially their old married couple play-fighting), then finish my homework before I watch "Bao Qing Tien" or "Justice Bao" in English (I am a die-hard fan at that time) every night (except weekends, coz it doesn't show on weekends) before going to bed.
At school, I was occasionally the center of attention because of my art skills and also because some of them go to English tuition and being that I am the only English expert among them, I helped them correct their mistakes. I even had my first crush there, in which he was very nice to me, always borrowing me things that I don't have. Even shared glasses with me when my eyesight started to fail and I couldn't see the blackboard. It was a little one-sided though, and we broke it off as mere friendship after my time in this school ended.
And on weekends, I spend it with my youngest aunt and her husband, hanging out with them, doing my homework and basically being their instant daughter/niece. It's almost like my life back home when I was staying with my foster family, only that the visitations were with my aunt and uncle, not my mom or my dad. Sometimes, my aunt would read bedtime stories to me, some of them are of her own works (she is an illustrator for novels and children's books), while my uncle is being funny, smart, handsome and loving all in one. I even had a bit of a crush on him, but that's another story.
Somehow, my days as a foreign exchange student were soon destroyed bit by bit when my grandparents started to worry about the lack of news from my mom. My second aunt and her family came to visit (which was great because I finally was able to converse in my almost long forgotten English with my American cousins), so with her husband's help and lots and lots of phone calls made by my youngest aunt and her husband, they were managed to locate my mom, saying that she was doing alright and that in time, probably by the end of this semester, I will be going back.
I wasn't exactly the happiest kid in the world. I mean, sure, I may have felt a little glad at the time, knowing that my mom was doing alright and was not exactly found dead in a ditch or something, so to speak, but I have grown so accustomed to the lifestyle here in Taiwan that I’m not sure I ever want to leave. In fact, I was probably quite sure, at that time, that I wanted to stay in Taiwan permanently and leave my old life in Malaysia behind.
But of course, I can't say that after seeing my grandpa so happy that he was close to tears as he hugged my youngest aunt gratefully for finally finding my mom. Needless to say, when I told it to my classmates, they were less than happy as well as they wished me goodbye with tears and numbers and addresses, promising each other we'll keep in touch.
I was scheduled to fly back to my hometown about a few days after the semester end, and I remember waking up quite early to have my youngest aunt send me to the airport. It was the first time I was actually traveling alone. Imagine me, a kid barely 10 years old, taking a flight all the way back to my hometown. Of course, regulations doesn't really allow me to travel alone, so I had a very pretty air stewardess holding my hand and taking me to where I have to go and advising me what to do, then taking me to the plane and escorted me to my seat, all the while being very hospitable and entertaining my stories. At my seat, I also chat with a very nice lady and told her about my life in Taiwan, and we kept each other entertained until we reached our destination.
Again, I was guided by another (or was it the same?) air stewardess and also the lady sitting next to me to get my bags and show my passport and stuff, and I saw my mom waiting for me outside the gate. I was a little bit happy to see her, but mostly indifferent. I don’t know why, I just didn't really feel the excitement of seeing my mother even though we've been separated for so long, unlike other kids who would jump and hug and call "Mommy~!" I wasn't that.
I'm not like other kids.
Being around people was nice, because it would act as a shield for me from being demonized by my mom (because I knew of all things, she treasured face-value and reputation above anything else), but of course, in private, my mom would still whack the socks off me and told me to shut up.
Personally I WANT her to beat me in front of everyone so that they will see what her true nature is, but it's wishful thinking.
I thought this time it would be a routine holiday where it would be instead of spending it with the holiday foster family. But then, I found myself being taken to many different important buildings by my mom and either along with my grandparents or my youngest aunt, and my memories of that time consist of walking past many odd, tall-looking cubicles and then into an office where a lady would be talking to my mom and my aunt or my grandparents on things while typing certain letters. Then after that I was taken to a primary school where they had a long chat with a teacher about me starting classes and I had a feeling at that age of mindset that I would probably have to stay longer than I should (which later on, when I was older, I realized that I was unknowingly put in there as foreign exchange student).
As I predicted, I stirred early in the morning at almost dawn to hear my mom talking to my grandparents. I couldn't hear what they said because I was trying to pretend to sleep and hear their hushed voices at the same time, but I could tell that my mom was dumping me off again to live with someone else while she disappears doing god knows what. So I wasn't too upset to know that she was leaving, because both her and my dad had done this to me so many times already that it was old school for me.
When I woke up in the morning and asked casually where my mom is, my grandparents looked worried at first when they told me that she had left and that I will be staying with them for some time, then I surprised them by taking it casually with a "Oh, OK" word and left it at that when they were expecting me to behave like any kid who would be upset and crying over their mothers disappearing on them.
They should know by now that I am not like other kids.
Studying in a Taiwanese school with a syllabus totally different than Malaysian style was a little tough for me. For starters, being raised in Malaysia and having a healthy appetite, I was the tallest among all my minute classmates. I remember perfectly what my class was called: Class 3-5. When I came in to introduce myself, they were all looking up at me as if I was a giant. I was the centre of attention for a while, as when break time started, the girls were pulling me while the boys were pushing downstairs to the playground, all trying to get to know me.
I was still a little bit of a Malaysian Chinese dialect back then, so it was a little awkward for me to communicate with them, but I more or less got the hang of it. And then the students themselves were probably way advanced than I was, being that they learn tons of things that doesn't even exist in Malaysian syllabus, like Science, for example, and Social Studies, which for them it's a mix of geography and Moral Education, so I think I was often called "stupid" behind my back. Well, I can't help it for being raised in a backwater country. And boy, do they have a foul-mouth, knowing how to curse and swear and speak taboo words that even friends my age back home would never dare utter.
Their school days style was like this: Mondays, Wednesdays and Fridays is a full-day study, while Tuesdays, Thursdays and Saturdays (yes, we actually have school on Saturdays) is a half-day study, and we have to wear alternate uniforms on those days (we get two different uniforms where one is worn on the full-days and the other worn on the half-days--personally I like the one worn on half-days best because they have a very nice dark blue coat, unlike the screaming orange for full-days), and on Saturdays, we get to wear whatever we want, so I always look forward to Saturdays where I can show off my pretty dresses.
Every period, we get a 10-minutes break time to play at the playground downstairs (which I bloody wish they had it back in Malaysia), and on full-days, we get an hour and half lunch break which we eat either from getting lunches from our parents who wait outside the gate (which my grandpa always does) or from the lunch bento-s from the school canteen (which you have to purchase a weekly coupon and give one everyday to get it). My youngest aunt helped me pay for a whole semester's worth of lunch bento to ease my grandparents' burden (see why I love her so much?), which entitled me to just show up without a coupon and get bento without having to fight with the crowd, and I was famous among the canteen staff for always being their regular customer for frozen Vitagen despite the biting winter (frozen Vitagen seems to taste better and last longer than liquid ones).
After lunch break (on full-days), we get about an hour long naptime before classes resume as per normal, which I kind of hate, because if I take naps, I can't sleep at night, so I just faked sleep by covering my head with the coat and do my drawings underneath, and always try to hold back from laughing because we actually have a snorer in class (seriously! She bloody snores in class during nap time!).
What I remember having learnt in their syllabus would be the National Language, Art, Music, Science and Social Studies. They also have classes like Calligraphy Writing in which I think I totally sucked at because I was always getting red marks from a very traditional, old school teacher. Calligraphy is part of the elective syllabus in which if the students wish to pursue a more in-depth study of it, they will have to go to his office which is in another building situated somewhere near the school gates where you get to sit in those really traditional Chinese seating with the sliding door and all the whatnot. I've been there once, on the last day of my studies, and that was the first and last time I've ever been in there.
They also have a rotation system in which everyone gets to be the class monitor for a week, which was awesome, because I had the chance to be in control of the classroom and bear the responsibility of leadership and telling everyone to stand up and greet the teacher before class started, and it is the time where I don’t have to take naps but write down names of people who don’t take naps, meaning I hold the key of every of my classmate’s “life and death”. It was also the first time I actually learn Science in class when it is not part of the syllabus for Malaysia, and I remember one of our science project was to rear a bunch of silk worms to see its process from a larva to a moth, and it was an amazing experience when we set the moths free after that at the end of the project.
I remember that because they have a different way of using phonetics in reading Chinese than the classic pin-ying that Malaysian Chinese use, I was at a disadvantage because I didn’t know how to read the tougher words, only the basic ones, and of course, their Chinese is not the simplified Chinese, but the traditional Chinese with bloody more strokes than the regular simplified Chinese. The teacher saw my predicament and for about 2, 3 months, I was exempted from naps to be given special lessons to learn Taiwan phonetics.
At first she requested my classmates to teach me, exempting them from naps as well, but I always end up getting distracted and chat with them instead of learning, so she decided I should be with a really very nice teacher at a rec room next to the library. She would teach me how to properly read, write and pronounce the phonetics and at every end of the lesson, she would allow me to pick a book for her to read for me and for me to learn to read as well, just to improve my skills. I remember there was a set of children's series starring this very cute little kitten and his daily life escapades with his furry friends, and I always pick from that series.
During my days learning with her, I had the time of my life. During naps, I would quickly scurry away from class and run all the way towards the direction of the rec room where she would be waiting. I admire her dedication to forgo relaxing time to pay attention to me, and I owe her a lot for that. Sometimes when I wait for her to arrive (if I was early) I would eye at the cupboard to see really nice colouring pencils and pens and there was one very nice one that I have been eyeing forever: a colouring marker set that has a very beautiful picture of the character Candy from the old school anime Candy Candy. During the last days of my phonetics tuition with the teacher, she said I could pick anything from the cupboard as a graduation gift, and that was my inspiration to excel the phonetics test. I passed with flying colours and finally got what I was yearning for, although a scatterbrain like me ended up losing the yellow colour barely a week after I got it.
My dad somehow figured out where I was and would call to talk to me once in a blue moon, in which sometimes my grandma would make me pass the phone to her so that she could scold my dad for being a good-for-nothing bastard who bullied her daughter and squandered their money (apparently at one point, my dad actually borrowed money from my grandparents to cover his debts but never paid back), but all in all, at least he called, to check on me and see how I was doing. My mom, on the other hand, literally dropped out of the face of the earth. She never called, never wrote, and never even left any form of contact so that we could find her to see how she was doing. None. I never heard a single word from her since the day she left.
In time, I almost totally forgot that I used to have a life in Malaysia. I go to school, study, come home and have my usual meals with my grandparents (watching their funny antics in the process, especially their old married couple play-fighting), then finish my homework before I watch "Bao Qing Tien" or "Justice Bao" in English (I am a die-hard fan at that time) every night (except weekends, coz it doesn't show on weekends) before going to bed.
At school, I was occasionally the center of attention because of my art skills and also because some of them go to English tuition and being that I am the only English expert among them, I helped them correct their mistakes. I even had my first crush there, in which he was very nice to me, always borrowing me things that I don't have. Even shared glasses with me when my eyesight started to fail and I couldn't see the blackboard. It was a little one-sided though, and we broke it off as mere friendship after my time in this school ended.
And on weekends, I spend it with my youngest aunt and her husband, hanging out with them, doing my homework and basically being their instant daughter/niece. It's almost like my life back home when I was staying with my foster family, only that the visitations were with my aunt and uncle, not my mom or my dad. Sometimes, my aunt would read bedtime stories to me, some of them are of her own works (she is an illustrator for novels and children's books), while my uncle is being funny, smart, handsome and loving all in one. I even had a bit of a crush on him, but that's another story.
Somehow, my days as a foreign exchange student were soon destroyed bit by bit when my grandparents started to worry about the lack of news from my mom. My second aunt and her family came to visit (which was great because I finally was able to converse in my almost long forgotten English with my American cousins), so with her husband's help and lots and lots of phone calls made by my youngest aunt and her husband, they were managed to locate my mom, saying that she was doing alright and that in time, probably by the end of this semester, I will be going back.
I wasn't exactly the happiest kid in the world. I mean, sure, I may have felt a little glad at the time, knowing that my mom was doing alright and was not exactly found dead in a ditch or something, so to speak, but I have grown so accustomed to the lifestyle here in Taiwan that I’m not sure I ever want to leave. In fact, I was probably quite sure, at that time, that I wanted to stay in Taiwan permanently and leave my old life in Malaysia behind.
But of course, I can't say that after seeing my grandpa so happy that he was close to tears as he hugged my youngest aunt gratefully for finally finding my mom. Needless to say, when I told it to my classmates, they were less than happy as well as they wished me goodbye with tears and numbers and addresses, promising each other we'll keep in touch.
I was scheduled to fly back to my hometown about a few days after the semester end, and I remember waking up quite early to have my youngest aunt send me to the airport. It was the first time I was actually traveling alone. Imagine me, a kid barely 10 years old, taking a flight all the way back to my hometown. Of course, regulations doesn't really allow me to travel alone, so I had a very pretty air stewardess holding my hand and taking me to where I have to go and advising me what to do, then taking me to the plane and escorted me to my seat, all the while being very hospitable and entertaining my stories. At my seat, I also chat with a very nice lady and told her about my life in Taiwan, and we kept each other entertained until we reached our destination.
Again, I was guided by another (or was it the same?) air stewardess and also the lady sitting next to me to get my bags and show my passport and stuff, and I saw my mom waiting for me outside the gate. I was a little bit happy to see her, but mostly indifferent. I don’t know why, I just didn't really feel the excitement of seeing my mother even though we've been separated for so long, unlike other kids who would jump and hug and call "Mommy~!" I wasn't that.
I'm not like other kids.
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