When I was 12 years old, I went to see a child psychologist. I saw the forms my mum had to fill in before they would “accept” me. I didn’t wet the bed and I wasn’t scared of the dark so I wasn’t sure why I had to go. So what if I had told everyone at school that I didn’t have a Chinese name? That I didn’t eat Chinese food and I had never been to an Asian grocery store? (We went every weekend.)
A few white lies didn’t mean I was a basket case. Just to prove it, I would sit in her room in silence for the full hour. If I didn’t say anything, I thought, then there was no way she could find anything wrong with me. She had a chess set in her room and so, to pass the time, she taught me how to play. In between taking her pawn and losing my queen, I finally talked.
My parents, sister and I had moved to Australia from Hong Kong three years earlier. It was the early 90s. I was eight years old.
I started grade four in middle class Melbourne where children had surnames with many syllables. There was one other Wong in class, so everyone thought we were related. We were not.
I had no idea why we moved. Yi min (to emigrate) was seemingly something everyone did back then. At my school in Hong Kong, the Chans were going to Canada, the Tams were going to New Zealand. We went to Hong Kong airport frequently, to send off cousins to the UK, the US and Australia. My grandparents had moved to Sydney two years prior. At least moving to Melbourne got us closer to them.
If I didn’t say anything, there was no way she could find anything wrong with me
I was told things like “our future would be better in Australia”. British Hong Kong was being returned to communist China in 1997, and we weren’t sure what life would be like without the Western ideals of democracy, free speech, freedom of the press.
But what did all that mean to an eight-year-old?
My dad, now retired and in his 70s, recently admitted that they used to say yi min was for the children. Stability and security were good things to have in the decades to come. But the parents didn’t always think about the immediate impacts of childhood displacement or what would be lost in the process. Hong Kong people were even less likely to talk about it, to “save face” so any struggle was hidden, glossed over, ignored.
He lamented his lack of foresight and not getting the support that I needed earlier.
My parents went to see a therapist too
I think my dad was a bit harsh on himself. He and my mum did find me help. For about 12 months in my pre-adolescent years, Mum would drive me to the clinic every week (later, fortnightly and then monthly). Mum made a big effort to study the route. She had learnt to drive later in life so she was really only comfortable driving to school and to the shops. My parents went to see a therapist too and we would occasionally regroup for a family session. My dad finished work early to make these and he never missed them.
After a painfully slow start, I started to talk, of how embarrassed I was when I didn’t have a present for the kid whose name I had drawn because I didn’t know what kris kringle was, how much I stood out on my first day in “free dress” because my bottle green uniform had not arrived in time, how I felt when the kids asked me repeatedly to say “sheep” and then laughing their heads off when I said “shit”.
In some way, timing worked in my favour.
I feel lucky to have parents who encouraged me to talk and a psychologist who created a safe environment for me
Primary school finished and it was time to move onto high school. A new school meant a clean slate for all. It helped me (to an extent) blend in as I was no longer “the new kid” or “the migrant kid”. The answer to “where are you from” was your primary school, not your migrant back story.
I often think about my eight-year-old self, a life upended for reasons she couldn’t possibly have understood.
I think about all the eight-year-olds, past and present, who have been displaced. How many can access the support they need, and how many perhaps can’t.
I feel lucky to have parents who encouraged me to talk and a psychologist who created a safe environment for me to do so. I credit these sessions as the beginning of me opening up and finding a voice.
By telling stories, I grew, I learnt and I began to heal.
Lucille Wong is a freelance writer.
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