{ Indonesia }

Our Singapore football team is set to play against Indonesia in a couple of months. Dis puts me in abit of a pickle, as my mother’s side is actly Indonesian. Not sure who I’ll be siding wif…

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I have an interesting genetic makeup, where my dad’s side is half East Asian, and my mom is fully Javanese. Which theoretically means my appearance shld be leaning towards the Malay side.

But the universe decided to give me mostly my grandmother’s Nippon 🇯🇵 genes. When I was young ppl – actly no, even up til now – ppl always get my race wrong. Which makes things awkward becos I dun speak Mandarin, or Vietnamese, or wtv they think I am…

Dis oso means I sorta stick out when I’m wif my Indonesian relatives. Which makes it slightly more difficult to lie and get local ticket prices for attractions, rather than paying the higher tourists costs…

Unfortunately my height came from my mother’s side. Which is why I’m only pushing 5’5 😔

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Having an immigrant mother is honestly pretty cool, as it means we got to visit her side of the family at least once a year growing up. Staying wif them at their different living places like the outskirts, kampung and the city. Quite the change of scenery from my HDB flat in Yishun.

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Dis gave me the opportunity to interact wif the local community thru my extended family (who are thankfully pretty chill). Dis more directly exposed me to the different language, culture, and lifestyle, which contrast pretty significantly than dat of here. There’s hella big difference between visiting a country and actly staying with the ppl in the country.

Some of the family drama dat goes on there is oso pretty wild. Like my uncle who disappeared off to “work” everytime we visited (who turned out to actly be in prison for selling drugs). Or my other relative who got charmed by some witch’s black magic, which almost got him to divorce his wife 🫠

While it is very pleasant going to Dufan, or Mt Merapi, or a bunch of other attractions, wif dis ppl. And oso listening to their local bands Peterpan and ST12. The more important takeaway for me every time we visit is dat there’s more to life than wat’s here in Singapore. Dis is especially important when life here is pretty rigid and fast-paced.

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Over there they’re always very family-oriented. And not like the “work hard to not shame them” kinda way. More like the unconditional love sorta way, where everyone wld always do their best to be together, no matter how troublesome it might be. Happiness is a shared thing, and support is a given.

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Income and status is never rlly a serious topic of discussion. Work is just something everyone’s forced to do. A means to living, and never really idealised. As long as there’s enough money coming from it, then everything’s alright. Even if problems in dat regard do arise, the family will be there to help.

I think dats a pretty healthy way to go abt things. All abt dat work-life balance, and mutual support.

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Though I won’t lie, I think sometimes it’s abit skewed, with less weight put on the work side than there shld be. Seeing workers sleep in their rundown shophouse at 1pm isn’t a promising sight. Neither is the whole customer service team (except one poor fella) going for lunch at the same time together for the next 2 hours, while the queue had just gotten longer…

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Meanwhile over here its the other end of the spectrum. Ppl are overworked from the beginning, but dun see it as an issue. Then when they do, they get stressed and blame the world. Dis stress builds up, and gets worse as the cost of living rises but wealth increments dun follow. So now we have a bunch of stressed out Singaporeans who have no time and energy for family, and friends who are slowly drifting away…

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In a way, I sometimes try to carry over the way of life there, over here. But I dun think it’s rlly appreciated. To my friends and colleagues, it just gets me perceived as a bum who doesn’t wanna work. Dat sorta sucks. I feel like there’s a loss in translation, somewhere… 🤔

In fact, I think everyone here shld have an immigrant parent. It’ll certainly help wif broadening our worldview. I noe grass is always greener on the other side. But maybe sometimes the green is actly worth appreciating from far, ye?

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30.03.2026