Humanism – Racism

Touch Down

On one gliding breath

An Asian baby

Touches Australian ground

Is nested in loving arms

Who does the baby

belong to?

Is it to her parents

living in Malaysia

With four children already born

Or is it to her adoptive family

A pride of many

Whose branches will spread far

Or does she belong to her

Younger sister and brother who

In childhood were brought to a

Strange country like herself ?

Primary School

"Twit and twot"

The jeers fly fast

At primary school these girls also

Perform antics to win a few hot chips.

My greasy bundle is

Hard-earned

With a parent’s note

Permitting me to visit the shop

Near school

High School

In First year at High School

Mum suggested to me that

I leave my glasses at home.

Short-sighted, I ask the girl beside me

If I can copy her notes from

The blackboard

"Don’t worry about appearances,"

She says,

"See that other girl,

She’s wearing glasses."

On my nose the glasses end up

Making no difference.

Louise with golden hair likes me

She’s studious and independent

The same as me and

In time we drift our own ways

Anne can’t think for herself

She turns sour, her ‘friendship’ clotting

And sticking to a honeyed trap

For flies

The cool girls fight it out

While in their shadows

I wait

Biding my time to take

The boxing ring.

Fourteen

In Singapore

My real brother begins

A teaching course

My real sisters, other brother, parents

Are working

I wonder where my real

Younger siblings are.

The mob here is amoeba like

As children are born

Parts of me are split off and

Hate in me is born

When one day in town

A woman is motherly until she

Shoves me aside

Saying, "Get out of the way,

You Asian tart."

I still have dreams

Of school children, university

students and adults

Merciless with their taunting,

Of girls younger than me laughing,

"What did she say, get the Japs? and

They’re here to buy the library."

The followers, like curs at

Their Leader’s heels

Are always there and defence

Like a dagger

Was always in my heart

I still have a desire to get rid of

The graffiti,

"Asians Out"

When some of my friends said

"You’ll never get rid of it,

It’s the same everywhere"

I wondered if they were really

Trying their best to help me.

I am looking not for placation

But for answers to discrimination

And unkindness everywhere

I remember once when

A ten year old at the beach

Said softly to me

"Why don’t you Asian people go Home?"

I love the beach,

The sand, the sea, the moon

Here and far over the water too

Standing where the moon’s silver

Floods thousands of perfectly formed Grains

I feel trapped between

Two worlds

Sixteen

In the school photo I look

Hardened, arms folded

Head on one side

The look on my face

Is shrewd, unhappy, enclosed,

Unfriendly,

Deadly serious.

At seventeen the students are so busy

They forget to make fun of me

Before final exams,

The girl on the fringes

Turns into my defender

Suddenly at seventeen

With a future ahead

She is against the jeering boys.

The Future

Once while I am going on an outing

A stranger says, "I wonder if she can see over the steering wheel?"

"Of course I can," I answer the girl Loudly,

"Otherwise I wouldn’t be driving."

She looks embarrassed.

My father advises me to

Ignore people like that

But I look at him doubtfully

My new friend at work tells me

"People like that are in-secure.

She says "People make fun of me

Because I’m slim and they are jealous

They call me skinny."

I take her advice not to worry

About them

But when in town at night

I’m handed a sticker

‘Stop the Asian Invasion’

I think about learning a martial art

A New Beginning

I find a new beginning

When the yells from cars

And abuse given out from people

In boats while I am sitting

By the river side,

Being run off the road

By kids on bikes while

I am on walks in my neighbourhood,

The remarks of "there goes chop suey"

By a stranger at a friend’s party

And ‘aren’t they well fed"

In times of recession,

No longer anger me.

It is because I realise that

Even though I am as Australian

As I’ll ever be

I will always be treated

By someone as ‘Asian’

because I ‘look Asian’.

Only when I accepted this did

The threat to my inner security subside

Strange would be supporters often

Say to me impersonally

"Isn’t it sad that you’ve lost

Your heritage,

Been ‘transplanted’ from Asia to Australia?"

No-one asks -

"How do you feel about being

Brought up between

Two different worlds?

Yet along my unique rocky path

There has been and still are

Lights burning

They are the love of my

Adoptive parents

The bond between my sister and I

And my Spiritual Self

I have dreams of visiting China

I have dreams of people

Living in harmony.

I believe that pride and confidence

Come in truly knowing oneself.

I know I have Chinese genes

And that I am adopted.

But I am not a foundling

Rather, I believe that I am

a child of God.

I also know there is a lot more to Discover

Yet , already my life has taught

Me much

About humanism and racism.

Written at age twenty one

© Lai Chew Yarn

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