A novel titled “The Human Stain“, tells a story about a black man who spent his entire professional life passing as a white man. A scene that particularly interesting is when he brings home his white girlfriend, and introduce her to his black mother. His girlfriend broke down in tears when she find out that he is actually a black man, and eventually she left him. This event shook him and from then on he did not admit that he is a black man.
I find the above story interesting because it is somehow connected to my life. For your info, I’m not black. I’m Indonesian-born Singaporean Chinese. Confused?…Let me put it in point form. Here is my profile: Born in: Indonesia. Nationality: Singaporean. Race: Chinese. Like the protagonist in the above novel, sometimes I’m stuck between Indonesian and Singaporean. When people ask me what is your nationality?…what should I say?…Indonesian (not quite, since I’m Singapore citizen), or Singaporean (The born-and-bred Singaporean would frown and look me in disgust).
I believe the root of the issue is the “born-and-bred-in-Singapore” Singaporean attitude toward new citizens. These so called “true-blue-Singaporeans” do not accept new-Singaporeans as Singaporeans. “the original Singaporeans” would behave in the following manners toward their new brethens. First, purposely forget that the new singaporeans are singaporeans. They will ask recurring questions like: “when you go back to your country?…”; ”are you a Singapore PR?…”. Second, remind that new singaporeans are still foreigners. They will state “but you are not born in Singapore”; “but you never do National Service (NS)”.
Honestly, I find it difficult to make lasting conversation with the “born-and-bred-in-Singapore” Singaporeans. In addition to the above behavior, they often “put me out of conversation”. For example: talking about NS, about the goodness / greatness of Singapore (e.g. we singaporeans like to watch National Day Parade), or about Singapore politics climate.
The Singapore government coined the term “One Singapore”, which I think reach to Singaporeans in all races. However, this term left out those Singapore PRs that took the plunge and converted to Singapore citizens. The government should campaign to educate the “born-and-bred-in-Singapore” singaporeans to accept their new brethens, otherwise I’m afraid that the government efforts to convince Singapore PRs to convert to Singapore citizens would be less effective.
Singaporeans are fast becoming multi-racial, multi-ethnic, multi-religion and multi-country-of-origin. It is sad to see that ”born-and-bred-in-Singapore” Singaporeans fail to accept this simple truth.
