The colour of love

I've just finished reading this article written by a mum who's given birth to a mixed-race daughter (she's white, baby's father is Indian). I am a Malaysian of Chinese heritage and Top Monkey is white, so I share some of the feelings that she has.

In an ideal world, our Little Monkey will just be plain Little Monkey, not Little Mixed Race Monkey or Little Eurasian Monkey or Little Half white-Half Asian Monkey. I worry for her future - if she were brought up in UK, would she be ostracised because of the part of her that I am responsible for? Or if she were brought up in Malaysia, will she always be classified under "Lain-lain"? (lit. Others.. Malaysian forms generally require you to state your race) Will she always be judged by her mixed-ness first? Should her name reflect her dual heritage or should she just have a "white" sounding name to protect her from society's prejudices? I mean, like it or not, the fact is that even here in Malaysia, we still have this Love the White Sahib culture.

More importantly - what do I tell my child if one day she comes running to me in tears because some idiot has made fun of her colour?

Off to Jakarta!

Whee! I'm off to Jakarta tomorrow for a visit. As I've mentioned before in this post, we're moving to Jakarta soon. My beloved TM has just been appointed Overlord of Jakarta (as I put it) and I'm really excited to be moving to a new place! I've lived all my life in Malaysia and I can't wait to experience another country.

I'm all packed and ready to go. This will be my first recon visit, it's a chance for me to check out the neighbourhood, to check out the housing available and to see if the shops stock the same stuff we get back here. We'll also be looking at making new friends there, both local and fellow expats and I'm quite eager to join several social clubs. TM loves little dinner parties and I'm looking forward to hosting them when we're there.
I'll also be checking out the hospitals since I'll need to get to know some gynaes there. If anyone has any recommendations, please let me know.

I am so excited to be able to see my TM daily again. He's been shuttling back and forth between Jakarta and KL for some time now and I really hate not being able to see my husband every day.

Jakarta, here I come!

Choosing Unique Baby Names

Ok, I do realise this is a little premature but it's so much fun to think of names. TM and I have done it before, usually when we're curled up on the couch after dinner and we're in that cosy mood. We haven't worked out yet if the baby should have a combination of English-Chinese names to reflect her heritage but we've got lots of time yet!

Each time I think of names for Little Monkey, I can't help but think of these fellows...

Unique Name #1: My father once taught a pair of brothers who had the most unusual names. Their surname was See. The elder boy was called See Major... so it made a lot of sense that his younger brother was named See Minor! Dad reckons their father must have been mad on music.
Unique Name #2: Sophia's friend came from a family of 11 siblings and he was the youngest. By the time he was born, his mother must have run out of names because he was named Wong Tee Pot.
Unique Name #3: This was my aunt's childhood friend. Her name, Poh Pai, looked innocent enough on paper but if you say it quickly, you end up saying "Popeye".


So there you go. If you have heard of any unusual names, please let me know!

Project Little Monkey

We've just started trying, so I don't know either! :)))

Introducing the Top Monkey Family - Mr Top Monkey

Now, this is Mr Top Monkey. TM for short. TM was born in England a long time ago and this pic was taken when he was about 5 years old, I think. According to my MIL, he was a "...beautiful baby!" I agree! TM was brought up in Liverpool but thankfully doesn't talk Scouse or communication would have been a major problem between us.

TM has just been appointed Overlord of Jakarta. Well, not really. He's just been announced as the new head of his Jakarta office, which is why we're moving there soon. I'm going to miss living in KL, I am.

What's life with TM like? Well, life's heavenly so far! TM is one of those men who can actually cook, do the laundry, clean the house and bring you breakfast in bed. The only time he's unbearable is when he insists on playing odd jazz music on the hi-fi. TM is very fond of music and even fonder of his hi-fi system. Being English, TM has some odd habits which I cannot understand. Odd Habit Number One: wearing shoes into the house. Odd habit Number Two: Eating beans on toast and having peas with almost everything.

Why is he called a Top Monkey? Well, when I first moved in, I would get really peeved each time he brushed crumbs off his shirt onto the floor. His reasoning? "Why? We're going to vacuum anyway!" So I started picking the crumbs off him before he could brush it off. One day, Nat Geog showed a docu on monkeys where the monkeys who were on the lower end of the social ladder would groom the alpha monkey in the troop in pretty much the same way. *LIGHTBULB MOMENT* And thus, the Top Monkey was born.

We met end of 2005 at a Liverpool FC match viewing session. Haha. We're both crazy mad Reds, you see. We got engaged at the end of 2006 and married a year later. I never saw him coming, but I'm glad he did. Life's funny sometimes. :))

Introducing the Top Monkey Family - Mrs Top Monkey

Thought it was time I did a post introducing the Top Monkey family.

This is me. Mrs Top Monkey. Well, in that pic, I was about 6yo and not a Mrs anything yet. I was born and bred right here in Malaysia. I used to work in consumer marketing for the likes of Colgate but have given up all that exciting corporate life so that I could focus on caring for Mr Top Monkey.

Before we were married, I could only cook instant noodles and boiled eggs and always sang in the shower. Now apres married life, I can cook roasts and chicken rice and don't sing much anymore.

Five things my friends don't know about me:

1. I used to be able to play the piano pretty well. I lasted all the way till Grade 7 of the ABRSM syllabus before I quit.

2. I was President of the Gymnastics Club in my sixth form. This was an absolute mistake as I was, and still am, stiff as a board. I did as little work as I could and was always skipping meetings!

3. I used to be able to leap like a grasshopper. I was small but very agile as a child and could always be depended upon in the game of getah (lit. rubber. A children's game in Malaysia where ropes are made out of linked rubber bands and kids take turns to jump across).

4. I am frightened to death of butterflies and clowns.

5. I used to make up football chants for Liverpool FC for my own amusement. Example below which I composed during the ultra-frustrating season of 2004-05 (to the tune of Supercalifragalisticexpialidocious)

"Up and down domestically, now number 5 in league

Some say it's luck or injuries or maybe just fatigue

Six games to go, five points behind and Tottenham to beat*

Super Rafa's Liverpool, we're still in Champions League! "*This line would change each time we played match and the points difference between us and Everton changed

My grandparents set sail from their little village in Hainan Island, China a long time to escape the communists and to find a better life in the then Malaya. My parents were born here, so that makes me a 2nd generation Malaysian. I am who I am today because of their sacrifices. If they hadn't worked so hard and insisted on educating us all, I doubt if I would be sitting pretty here in our KL apartment and typing all this out on this fancy laptop.

My grandfather passed away in 1994 and my grandmother 10 years later, so they never got to meet the wonderful man I married. I wish they had because they would have been so amazed at how much things can change in 2 generations.