(1040) Brains

Many people could not believe that I was Chinese educated. In fact I was very poor in English for many years. This brain of mine was not designed to learn English or any other phonetic languages. I was equally poor in Malay, a language that has been Romanised. However, Chinese came very easily. I did not need to try, I could memorise poems and essays after a few readings. By the time I was nine years old, my composition book was passed around the staff room and every Chinese teacher of the next Standard would love to take my class, especially those who loved to teach writing. My primary school was a premier school, there were ten classes of every Standard. Each class had a minimum of 50 pupils. I was a transfer pupil: number 52 on the register.

( My eldest, a son, inherited this unusual memory in terms of everything related to food. My youngest, a daughter, also could remember anything to do with music and lyrics. The rest are above average but do not have instant recall)

In Standard Six, my principal tried to talk me into furthering my Chinese education. I was from a poor family, she found sponsors to send me to a private Chinese High School and guarantee that I would have scholarships to go to a Taiwanese University to study Journalism. Apart from being good in my writing, I could persuade and talk a hind leg off a donkey. I was rather out-going and talk a mile a minute. Had I gone in that direction, today I would not be English speaking, neither would I be blogging in English. My dad heard about the generous offer a few years down the line and was mad at my stupidity until his last illness. My mum thought I was a goner, whether it was Taiwan or USA, I would be gone and would not return. She was very surprised that I came back at all. Of course she benefitted from the fact that I stay 11 minutes by car from her for the past 13 years up to now(except for the two and a half years I spent in Borneo).

Completing pre-university, I went to US on a scholarship. After my Bachelor's degree, I was offered a place in U of Mass in Amherst. Sad to say, the scholarship I was given was to U of Texas at Arlington. I spent a month at Arlington with my brother's friends. Perhaps it was a correct decision because I would unavoidably become depressed there - it was such a colourless place. Everything was brown in tone - it was semi desert and dry. I have seasonal light disorder, I need a certain number of hours of sunlight to have good mental health. Given a choice, I would go to places that are bright, colourful and vibrant. Both Malaysia and Virginia fulfil that criteria. Therefor I could be happy in both places in the long haul.

I do not regret the decision to return to my birth country. But looking at the leaps and bounds of artificial intelligence, I wonder what would have been the alternate reality had I joined in that field in the early eighties. It would have been challenging and fun, maybe very frustrating as I am Asian and a woman at that. In real life, I gave that up and meddle with the brains of my children and that of all my students in Silver City. Great fun too, very instructive and time-consuming. One only sees the result like 15 years later.