My life - Part 10

When I was 7 we moved from Raub to Kuantan. I was already in Standard 1, but couldn't write a word and couldn't speak Malay at all. In Raub I remember school to be fun and games. In Kuantan it was the opposite. When I started school in Kuantan, it was exam time and I think I failed everything gloriously, almost 0 for everything including English because I couldn't write. I also had great difficulty communicating because everyone spoke Malay and I could only speak English.

There was one incident in particular that stands out in my mind. We had Moral Studies class, where only the Chinese and Indian girls would remain, the Malay girls would go for Islamic classes. I was new to the school and this was my first Moral Studies class. The teacher asked all of us to stand, and then she called out the pupils' names one by one and they got to sit down. After a while she stopped, and those who remained standing, including me, she announced to the class were the 'bad girls' in school. The first thing that crossed my mind was, how the hell did she even know who I was, I just got to this school! Then I looked around and saw that all the Chinese girls had sat down, whilst all the Indian girls were still standing up. At that time, I thought the teacher was unfair for branding all Indian girls as bad girls without even knowing who we are, but now I know it was racism.  I was too young to protest then, but it heightened my instinctual sense of equality or the lack thereof so that even after this many years, I remember this incident with singular clarity.

There were many other similar incidents that happened in primary school after that first incident, some subtle, some not so subtle. In addition to being an outcast due to my race, I was a slow learner, not because I couldn't learn anything fast, but because I didn't want to. I didn't like the fact that my life was being controlled by teachers and classes when before, I could do pretty much whatever I wanted to do. School was like a prison to me, I was forced to do things I didn't like to do, when all I wanted to do was play. 

I was an outcast and I was stupid but I didn't care at all.