I was molded into a claypot until I molded myself...
I remember my birth date, month and year. My brother came out with an appearance similar to that of my parents and extended family. I have double eyelids and skin that is slightly darker than most of my extended family, making me the black sheep. I had an attachment problem since my birth as I cried every time my loved ones left me and I cried during rainy days when I was young, but now the raindrops do not bother me. I was too young to find out, but I am still working on the reason.
When I was a kid, I loved reading books, which continued when I attended university. I was diagnosed early with high-functioning autism and ADHD; thus, I attended speech and occupational therapy throughout preschool. I was introduced to homeschooling at age 7 because she was worried, I could not integrate into government schools because last time kids like me were not welcomed and my Chinese is so bad. It was a special school funded by the Pentecostal Church. My parents tried to force me to be perfect and got angry and bullied me when I showed signs of autism or emotions.
I met my first friend, and I enjoyed my everyday workout even though I was tired. The first three years are great until I reach fourth grade. I witnessed my friends being abused and forced to bully each other by the teachers. I felt like I lived in a madhouse where empathy did not exist. I was duct taped in my mouth, from which I cannot breathe, and in one of my hands. A chat with a male homeschool teacher almost got me into being sexually groomed by him, as he put a blushing emoji. On one occasion, he was forcing me not to go along with my schoolmate's car, which all of them got into, and forced me to ride in his car, which is no wonder there are no girls in his own school that he established.
I got spanked when I made a mistake accidentally or deliberately and censored my writing. My mother did not know about evangelism until she and I went to a church camp. As a tween, I realized that I needed to be saved by going to church every Sunday and to the extent of running away from home a few times. When I was a fifth grader, I remember being hit in the left eye by a wooden spoon thrown by a teacher. I was shocked when one of my friends threw bathroom objects and became naked because she panicked and became crazy. When I started my first period, I felt so ashamed to go to school that I had to stay home for two weeks. I play computer games and watch kid shows to escape this pain briefly. I was hurt with scissors by a boy in Sunday school; no one rescued me. My mother did not know about Pentecostalism until she joined me at a church camp. It is quite funny because she turned to this after her parents passed away from heart attack.
For my secondary education, I was transferred to another homeschool center. In the first year, I was falsely accused of hacking to access the internet and stealing workbooks from seniors.
But I have lots of good memories and achievements.
I joined my first science camp, which triggered my interest in physics and mathematics.
I have friends who are primarily seniors in my school who are honest and also rebellious enough that they are suspended.
I joined my first STEM camp in 2017 and was able to be less dependent on my phone, which motivates me to join more STEM trials.
I am addicted to math and have joined many co-curricular activities like 3D printing, web development, and coding.
I wrote my entire chemistry test with a green pen as a prank.
I joined the school's talent contest and track day for 2018 and 2019.
I enjoyed weekly track workouts and strength training.
I love fencing so much that my teacher sent me to a fencing trial class.
But it is also where I got gaslighted by my schoolmates and have trouble forming friends and long-term relationships because I attended a purity culture workshop where I was taught that I have to be ashamed, suppress my emotions and feelings, to please men, cover every inch of it, stay away from boys and be meek, perfect, and save sex and BGR for marriage. I recently found a dark secret: the founder of the evangelical organization interviewed the serial killer and rapist who also came from a highly religious home, blamed pornography for his crimes, and advocated for him to be pulled out of the death sentence. No wonder I found a secret recipe for pornography in my booklet for this workshop.
I could not be friends with the girls in my school due to my cold but gritty attitude. I would come home and cry in my bedroom after school. Luckily, I was not alone because my seniors told stories of their friends being victim-blamed and threatened to go to the principal's office by those who studied here for a long time. I am also sick of being rejected from most competitions and activities held by my school because of my gender and the toxic pyramid scheme in my school's organization.
The darkest years in this center are the last years where I prepare for IGCSE. I was the only girl in my batch who is studying sciences, and I was disturbed by the construction noise and classroom mess that I had to clean in detail. Writing stories became an escape from those dark moments. Unfortunately, language and appearance are censored and restricted. My reality is dislocated and twisted by this center as I prepare for IGCSE. The weekly chapel turned from warm and friendly to brainwashing and confusion; one of the sessions is about the worst president in the US history who is partly responsible for the spread of COVID 19 , and the other one is disturbing, where poor cows and sheep were killed for nothing.
I had a classmate who transferred from India. She was skinny and beautiful, and my homeroom teacher likes to compare me to her. She almost lost her vision to be a doctor due to anorexia; she did well on the national exams, but her test score dropped slightly drastically, and she was fainting on her desk with a stomach ache in front of me. If I seek medical attention from her, I will be punished. My homeroom teacher hopes that she will come back to us, but thankfully she did not come back. My homeroom teacher was racist, capitalist, and sexist, if I were to describe her in three words. Her constant body-shaming comments and drinking alkaline water to reduce her hunger make me assume that she used to have body dysmorphia. She even forced me to quit taekwondo, which I had started since I was 13, but she cannot, and I take up kendo in university, which is a double whack on her face.
A senior in my school, two years older than me, had a harder time preparing for his IGCSE because he was held back a year and unable to graduate for a very unfair reason: his mock scores. He is so devoted to the piano that he wishes to pursue music. He had to move to Malaysia from Singapore since he had a special needs brother who needs extensive and qualified treatment. At the end of the school year, he lashes out violently in front of our homeroom teacher and reveals her true nature; she was manipulative and abusive, and she wants my class leader to film me cleaning without my consent.
My first experience in the secular and outside world was when I entered the one of the university competitions of wits, I looked at how they think and solve problems. Competitors within the age range were so adaptable and progressive than my school. I was lucky enough to meet a facilitator about how my schoolmates treated me and witness an all-female team winning the design contest, which defies my school's teaching that women are innocent, naive, incompetent, and submissive. My parents and my homeschool teacher are planning to hold me back for half a year because I have Asperger's and am retarded. Then the COVID lockdown came and gave me a temporary break from mandatory events.
However, when I wanted clarification or was frustrated with my schoolwork, I was backstabbed by a few teachers, who told me I should refer to the modules more or quit yapping. Sometimes, I have video-call fatigue and a lack of boundaries in terms of online lesson privacy because I am not familiar with calls, but I was lucky enough that I have my batchmates and subject teachers who defy my school's code of conduct for teachers and leaked everything about my school. I almost fainted during some mock exams. Revision for IGCSE in my school was paying for them to print IGCSE papers and doing it; I escaped by learning to print on my own.
This time, one of the students who previously studied in my school joined me for revision, causing me to be involved with two love triangles. I was not invited to play Chow Tai Ti, which is a card game for the elite, and I am not part of the elite. I realized I had been oppressed more in my school and was gaslighted because I was starting to become bisexual, which is against the school's teachings. My English classes involved group work, where I struggled because they laughed and mocked my stories; thus, I went for English tuition. The tension between my batchmates, schoolmates, and even in-school teachers begins to rise. I lashed out my anger unintentionally at school. Graduation became a heavy burden in terms of price. It was a luxurious dinner that puts middle class families to debt, and one of the most expensive graduation ceremonies. I do not know that my homeschool centre has forced me to be there for all the activities they have organized as a control mechanism until I graduated and it was like in North Korea.
That is White Anglo Saxon Protestant culture in Malaysia where non-whites want to be whites. I succumbed to the pressure of plastic surgery before my graduation. The exam days have some light at the end of the tunnel. I have met a girl in a wheelchair who has an unknown disability. Everyone is fully masked, and some exam mates are friendly to me, until the point where I hang out with them for lunch and two boys in my school report it to my class teacher. After the exams, especially after my A-Levels, I do not know what to do. I had no choice but to stay at home, do chores, stare at the computer, and watch how fast everything changes.
I was more vulnerable to scams because of how I was taught to be submissive and people-pleasing and suffered from religious trauma syndrome. Then I took A Levels despite the homeschooling community and my parents being against it. My deficiency of math led me to join its Math Club where I became vice president. I joined a few math competitions and won third prize in a coloring competition. I tried to get into a UK university but my parents' fear of losing me forced me to drop it. I failed one audition, and my parents did not care and scolded me for crying. I have done drama since primary school and appeared in school plays but are minor and I need more so this audition is the only chance. They might want me to stay with them forever until they or I get married, but the only way out is to study for my bachelor's degree in physics.
I cannot access my legal documents and my passport, as they kept them hidden from me. I tried to make friends here and not to make the same mistake that I did in my homeschool, but I did them again and I unintentionally hurt anyone I befriended, physically and emotionally. When I was homeschooled, I was taught to hurt or be hurt, but luckily, I go for counselling, no matter if my parents disagree with it. I realized that everyone in my current university, especially my friends, are trying their best to push me out of my comfort zone, this is why I became more mature. Travelling is my best comfort and training zone to learn the national language and to be confident no matter what I wear.
My mom still gaslights and manipulates me emotionally, to the point that I am so confused. I felt like she was still a child mentally as she lost her childhood memories as she had to work in her parents' grocery store and her parents' passing when I was seven years old hit her harder, but eventually she become much wiser even after visiting Singapore a few times because everyone in Singapore is free to have their own style of fashion. My dad needs to control his rage, and last year, he revealed to me that he was spanked by his grandfather harshly after he made the family sink explode from clogging.
I have a problem of self-harming by slitting my arms. If I visited my parents' home, they had a huge pile of knives in their house, and it fuels myself harming thoughts. I hit myself for the first time since I was hit by my parents and grandparents if I was naughty. I lost my scholarship, but I am willing to get up and build the character that I wanted. Fine arts were one of the escapes that I had since childhood. I pour my emotions out by drawing on walls and floors. My mom signed me up for two art schools where I was forced to listen to the instructors' directions, which caused me to lose in my first two art competitions. I was then pushed into the fine arts world by my dad's company and got me out of my artist's block. My parents' obsession with cleanliness and perfection hinders my passion for art, but now that I have my own room, I am free to mess around, as mess sparks logical and creative thinking.
Unfortunately, I fell victim to scams a few times. One is that I lost a small amount of money from a fake eBay company. Art buyer scams are a serious issue. The second one, I was scammed the first time at Carousell in an art buying scam that cost me hundreds of dollars, and I filed a police report for it. While doing commissions, I felt hurt and relieved when I did a commission for a customer that turned out to pressure me to do a crime, so I blocked her. I got involved in some Youtube marketing MLM which turns out that they are using my money for higher "interest" of our bank savings which the more you pay, the higher you gain. If I do not, they will reduce my normal salary, and this was the point where I found out I was brainwashed, and I quit and blocked that company.
The bad things are balanced by the good things. I was the finalist for projection mapping competition and heritage art competition. As I continue my bachelor's degree, I will not stop losing parts of myself and become more independent, as I have escaped my homeschooling community and built a better personal statement for my master's degree. I did not know that I am much of a good leader until I led a few groups until now in my second year of university. My GPA in university is improving progressively. I would like to send the best thanks for my parents who praised me for breaking the cycle of generational trauma and changed their attitude to be there for me and for my current friends who teach me real life skills and help me be more mature. Best regards to the local artists who give me advice and support me.
~Wen Yi Hing