A migrant's psyche

It has been a long while since I could put my thoughts down. It has been a busy two months with my work starting, with adaptation to new work environment, with knowing new colleagues, with finding my ways around ...

Over the past weeks or so, we have also more opportunity to interact with other migrants, old and new. It is quite interesting to note a few things.

When I first went back from here to my home country more than 15 years ago, people from my home country used to ask me if this is a racist country. I used to tell them that interesting enough often it was the new migrants who had difficulty accepting even newer migrants. Those who have been here a long time seem to accept others better. I wasn't quite sure if I were right; I am still not sure.

But after 15 years, and after spending some time with some of the migrants here, there are 3 things that I found interesting.

Firstly, I met a guy in a meeting whose family has moved over, but who is still flying back to his home country regularly and for prolonged period of time to attend to his business there. Interesting to hear from a migrant like him that this country should not accept anymore migrants. He kept saying that there are too many migrants here and migrants are crowding out many of the places here - from housing and accommodation to school places, public transportation and traffic jams. It sounded as though those who have made it here first want to stop more people coming so that we don't have to share whatever good things here with others. I did not think it was polite to confront him the first time we meet - but if the country should not accept new migrants, than why should he and his family be accepted? Paul Hogan in Crocodile Dundee had a fantastic reply when the American female reporter asked him about the relationship between the aborigines and the white; he replied simply, yet profoundly, "Two fleas (the aborigines and the whites) arguing who owns the dog (the country)." Do we own this place simply because we are here first? Have we truly the right to exclude others from coming? As Christians do we not believe that God owns the place and we are but stewards here, and the main responsibility is to share our blessings with others, especially the less fortunate?

Secondly, it was interesting to hear what was the response to the Sri Lankan boat people. Most if not all believe that they should not be granted asylum. Somehow, we believe that most of them were trying to smuggle themselves into the country, and abuse the welfare system once here. And somehow we believe that instead of them we are more deserving to come here, either because of the amount of money we bring in or because of our skills. Is that so? Do we truly believe we have earned the right to be here? Whatever that we have, skills, money or anything else, are these not blessings from God? How are we different from them? We have not earned the right to be here, or anywhere else, for that matter. We are here by the grace and blessings of God, grace and blessings that are given us so that we can share with others.

Thirdly, we have a friend who recently went home for a few months, and when he came back he shared publicly that he was very glad we weren't back home. And we keep giving thanks that we don't have to suffer the racist policy and the discrimination back home. We thank God for the peace, the prosperity, and the good life. In fact, we keep reminding ourselves and our children of all these good things and we keep reminding each other. It is good to remind ourselves, and it is good to thank God. There is nothing wrong in giving thanks, but there is everything wrong if that is where we stop. It is even worst if to others we seem like gloating over their predicament, though that may be the furthest from our intention. The sentence "Thank God my children don't have to suffer from racist policy!" sounds good to those here; but how does it sound to the people back home? How does that sound to those who want to go but can't? How do you explain to your children when they read of this and ask you, as a parent, "Why don't we go?"

At the end of the day; I wonder if all these are the fruits of a deeper problem, a problem that we don't have an answer to, but choose to ignore it and bury it deep in the sand of our unconscious mind. I wonder at the end of the day, whether we can truly, honestly face up to this question, "Did we run away from the problems back home and let the less fortunate others face the music?" A related question is "Why did we leave?"

Why did we leave?!

First month

Yeap! I survived the first month of work. And praise God it hasn't been as bad as I thought. In fact, praise God, it has been quite okay.

I was nervous for awhile when I first started. After a month or so, I believe I am getting the hang of things.

There isn't much difference in the medical side of things. After all, human beings are remarkably alike in many more ways that we thought.

It's just the ways things are done - tests are easier to come by, finances less of a concern; and on the other hand, patients are more demanding and litigation more of a problem.

All these affect the way medicine is practiced here. For the better? Perhaps not always. Overall, efficiency suffers because doctors have to be more defensive.

Going to work is also not as bad. Driving across town to work is something that we are used to do in Malaysia. Traffic is better here as well. So there is not as bad as it seems.

The other thing is weather; weather here changes at the drop of a hat. It could be cold and damp one day, and hot and sunny the next. Overall, though, it is warming up, and we are beginning to have 30 degrees days even early in November. It is forecast that we will have one of the hottest years in decades, with peak temperature up to high 40s mid summer this year.

Work

Finally, I have started work.

Before I started work, I tried baking my bread again; and the two loaves were very successful. One was a simple basic white loaf of bread, the second a cinnamon raisin bread.

It was not too bad. The driving in wasn't too bad. It takes me about 45 minutes, and I arrive 15 - 20 minutes before work start.

The patient base is rather similar to those where I used to work. The challenge is to get to know the system - from small things like which form to use, which icon to click on the computer, to who to talk to.

The kids, though, have to come back by themselves. They take the bus, and walk some 20 minutes home. Good thing is, that is the most exercise my kids have had for a long while.

What surprised me was that for the first two days of work, when I arrived home, my daughter managed to cook dinner for the whole family.

Yes, she is only 13.

And she managed to cook dinner for all of us.

That makes me very proud.

Spring holiday

This has been a good start for us.



For starters, it has been wet over the last couple of weeks, and this brought a relieving supply of water to the dams of Melbourne. Water storage in dams is up, and there is so much snow in the Southern Alpine regions that the snow season is extended.





It also has been a good time for the family. With the last couple of weeks of leave at home, we get to do more baking and cooking. My second loaf of bread looks much better. My daughter was ambitious; she made raisin bun, Scottish crumpets, drop scones, chocolate puddings.


Our old friends from Malaysia visited us, and we went up to the Dandenongs together. The tulip blossom was incredibly beautiful. The kids had a wonderful time feeding parrots, parakeets and cockatoos. The towering gum trees stretching hundreds of feet into the sky was awe inspiring.



Thank God for such a time.

Thank God

Malaysia and Singapore are blessed lands. Surrounded by disaster all around, both countries remain safe and sound. To the west is the 8.3 Richter scale earthquake and the accompanying tsunami that devastated Samoa and some surrounding islands; to the east is another 7.3 scale earthquake in Padang, Indonesia. To the north in Vietnam, Laos and Cambodia is Typhoon Ketsana, and further northeast, another typhoon is on the way to northern Philippines and Taiwan.

And nestled right in the middle, safe and sound, is Malaysia and Singapore.

Praise God for that.

Stories of new migrants

There are a lot of misconceptions about migration and new countries. We often imagine the new place to be better in every way, from career to quality of life, to financial situation of the family, to almost anything and everything else.

Reality is often crueler.

We have not been here long - less than two months, and we have heard many stories of new migrants. The commonest problem is job.

We know of dentists who works as student dental nurses, just to scramble enough money to sit for the incredibly expensive dentist qualifying exam. The annual income of a student nurse is about 24k, the cost of the exam and its accompanying course is more than 40k. Often husband and wife, both dentists, have to work for years to save up enough money for one of them to sit for the exam. The passing rate? Less than 20%. Be prepared to work for a few more years and come back the next round.

There is also a thoracic surgeon who is working in the country 4 hours from here just to qualify as a general practitioner. Even after that, he cannot claim medicare rebate for 10 years - meaning he can't have his own practice but will have to work for an institution.

There are also doctors who work as medical laboratory technicians.

There are high level managers and successful businessmen who have their family here but they would keep their business at home and fly in and out monthly, often for years.

There are many more engineers and managers who have to study to become teachers, insurance agents or simply remain unemployed for protracted period of time.

I have yet met someone who is doing better here than in his/her home country.

Why, then, do people still come. Perhaps they didn't know better before coming. Perhaps what drove them away from their home country is worse than what they face here. But many of them come not so much for themselves, but for their children. They come for a dream.

For their hardship and their sacrifices, I pray that their dream will come true.

Spring

Spring is finally here.

Spring may have been a couple of weeks late, but it is finally here.

The flowers on my neighbour's fence blossomed beautifully. The bold tree that we thought dead produced a wonderful blossom.

The kids are on holiday, too. In their holiday, they managed to make roti canai and pizza, from flour, oil, salt etc.

Yet, this spring is less than happy for me. Soon I will start work, and the kids will start their term 4. I will have less time with the family, less time with the children, less time for cooking a hearty meal for the family, less time to spend in the kitchen with my daughter, or in the park with my son.

They, too, will have to depend more on themselves - from taking a bus home from school all by themselves, finding food once they reach home; and hopefully, quarrel less between the two of them in the midst of all these.

I will look back at these two weeks as one of the happiest time of my life. One of the hardest thing with having children is that you know for sure that one day they will leave you. And before that day come, let me store up my store of memory with the taste of pizza and roti canai that my daughter made, and the smell of fresh pine with my son by my side, and when the day finally come for them to leave, I will still cherish these moments and re-live them again, and again.