By the time I had turned 6, our family was on the move again - over Europe and returning to Southeast Asia. My father had been offered a teaching position at the National University of Singapore in the Electrical Engineering faculty. One of the perks of working at the University was that they offered all international teaching staff accommodation for their young families.

For 6 years, we lived in a reasonably sized housing estate along Dunern Road known as Collage Green. In the early 80s, living in housing estates was part of everyday life. While today you see multi-storey flats which manage the growth in population, smaller housing estates were more common back in the day which acted more like close-knit communities. After 10 years in the UK, my parents were finally back in their home environment – just a few hours drive from their respective hometowns in Malaysia across the Jahore Strait.

Collage Green itself consisted of 60-odd doubled-storey semi-detached houses all within walking distance of each other and accommodated families from all backgrounds - ranging from those across the Oceanic region, Europe, South Asia and the Americas.  The rationale for accommodating young families together was so the children could mingle with those their own age and provide a friendly environment. It worked – to a point. Many of my childhood memories were based around playing with neighbours my age group or close to it and we didn’t really care who was from where. 

College Green would hold an annual Christmas party in which all the children - no matter what their age - in the housing estate would come together in the morning of the party to help set up and decorate the local basketball court, ready for the evening party. A few weeks prior to the party, one of the adults would gather the children to form a Christmas choir and we would meet each weekend to rehearse the few Christmas carols that had been arranged for us by the organising adult. Despite the fact my current singing ability needs to be fine-tuned slightly, I do remember being able to hold a note reasonably well in my youth.

As a child, I found schooling hard. I have never been very academic which I believe disappointed my parents somewhat. My first years of primary school did not help as it had been school policy to learn a second language. While I would have been happy to learn a European language such as German, the only options available to me were Mandarin Chinese, Malay or Tamil - the three main languages spoken in the Southeast Asian region. Given my ancestry, my parents chose to enrol me into the Mandarin Chinese class. However, this caused a number of problems - least of which consisted of me having very little knowledge of the language, written or spoken. 

Mandarin Chinese is a complex language for anyone learning it for the first time. Many of its written characters are based purely on the student's recognition of them. At times, it is possible to guess what the  character means because most of the language is made up of two parts. If you can recognise one part of the character, you can generally guess the whole character and its meaning. However, if you have never learnt to read the language, it becomes a mammoth task - especially at the age of 6. Such was my lack of knowledge in the language due to my Western upbringing, special sessions were organized for me in attempt to me catch up. 

My classmates had already been given a rudimentary introduction to the language in kindergarten and the class in the first grade of primary school was a natural learning progression. They soon discovered that I was taking special lessons to catch up in the language and began questioning my actual need for the lessons. What made me so special that I needed one-on-one tutoring? When I explained mypredicament to them, I received a response that still haunts me to this day. They believed I was lying about my birthplace. After all, I looked Chinese. They had seen my parents and knew they were Chinese too. They even heard my parents speak frequent Chinese so there was no way that I was born in the UK because I didn't look like I had been, especially since I also had a Chinese name. From that day forth, not only was I behind in my knowledge of the Chinese language but I was also seen as an outcast amongst my classmates.

Singapore had and has been known for its strict laws and its disciplines of its citizens. This is particularly true for its discipline of its children. Disciplining children was much harsher than it is today. Children of today seem to have the right to report their parents to the authorities for any abuse that may be inflicted upon them - no matter how minor. Today's laws can see a parent being charged with abuse for smacking a children on the bottom when the child misbehaves. Children appear to be more fearless of their parents because they know they have rights and know that as minors, they are protected by the law.

Rewind to the 1980s. While Australian parents have harsh ways of disciplining children, Asian parents seemed to taken it to a new level. I'll be the first to admit that I was, by no means, an angelic child. I certainly had (and still do to this day) a rebellious streak that, in my parents' eyes, no Asian child should ever exhibit. I suspect that the rebellion was a result of having the Asian culture thrust upon me when I clearly didn’t want it. There was a level of expectation from parents and it needed to be maintained in the eyes of the public. In many cases, my parents' expectations were too high for me and they would always find an excuse to make me perform certain tasks even though I felt it was beyond my ability to successfully perform them. Because of this, I held a certain level of fear towards them. So much so, I dreaded the end of term report card.

Unlike the Australian schooling system, exams were held at the end of every semester of each primary school year. I have never been good at exams and hence my grades were fairly abysmal. Yet, despite all this, my parents still expected me to pass them with a certain grade.  The punishment for failing to meet the grade was a caning - and it wasn't just with a wooden ruler – it was caning in the proper manner. We used to have a feather duster that had a cane handle that hung in the broom closet and this is what my father used on my fingers and palm of my hand. While this would cause a huge outcry by today's standards, it was perfectly acceptable in the Asian society. In fact, unless I'm mistaken, to not discipline a child to that extent would have been seen as by other Asian parents as being too soft on the child.

Another of my parents' disciplines was locking the child in a room for a certain length of time. Now, I must admit that I have no real recollection of the actual misendeavour that ended in me being locked in the toilet for an hour. Being locked in a room is one thing but a toilet brought a whole new fear. While the toilet was thankfully clean, I remember being terrified out of my wits at the age of about 9 for being confined to such a small area. The toilet had a small window for ventilation which I attempted to use to my advantage by voicing my disapproval at my punishment. Of course, no one took any notice of my protests because they saw the punishment as an adequate tactic for discipline. As expected, neither did my parents who stuck to their guns and let me out after the hours end. Needless to say, I never repeated my misendeavour.

As well as disciplinary actions for bad grades, Asian parents frequently send their offspring for extra tutoring to improve their grades. This practice still exists today and I remember quite clearly being tutored at home by my father who, in addition to checking that I did my regular homework from school, would set homework from the tutoring sessions as well. My father was senior lecturer at the university's Electrical and Electronic faculty at the time and made it his duty to offer me extra tutoring in mathematics. I vividly recall being given lessons in advanced algebra at the age of 10. At times, I wondered as how I managed to find the time to socialise with the other children in the housing estate. To this day, my knowledge in mathematics – especially in mental arithmetic - is still somewhat questionable.

Not all Asian parenting techniques were harsh, however. One of the more pleasant techniques I was subjected to was learning to play the piano at the age of 8. Back in the 1980s, my parents purchased one for approximately $1000 with the intention that I learnt to play it. The piano would eventually be shipped with us to Australia when we migrated there in 1987. There seems to be a bit of a stereotype going around which claims that all Asian offspring can either play the piano or the violin. The idea is for them to become extremely good at a single instrument although why the instruments of choice had to be pianos and violins is (and will continue to be) beyond my comprehension. However, I am thankfully for the opportunity my parents gave me to learn the piano, despite the insistence in the duration of daily practices. I recall being forced to practice each day for at least an hour before I was allowed to go outside and play with the other children. As I grew older, that duration increased to two hours. Despite all these, I was proficient in the piano even though I only manage to reach the third grade practice level and second grade theory level. However, both my siblings managed to make it to grade eight in both violin and piano, once again causing my parents to see me as a disappointment against them. Thankfully, my knowledge and skills in piano playing and music composition proved to be invaluable years later as a classical music composer.