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   Adrianna Tan (skinnylatte@hachyderm.io)'s status on Saturday, 03-May-2025 11:58:51 JST Adrianna Tan

   This morning I went to the Singapore consulate on Market St in San Francisco to vote. Lucky for me it was just a short walk, but I met up with a friend who lives in New Mexico, who came here just to vote (he felt strongly about the contest in his specific seats back home).

   Entering the lobby of the nondescript office building, we were greeted by a printout of a Singapore flag. Some signs indicate we were ‘home’: under the flag, it said QUEUE HERE. (After many years in Murica, I would just say ‘join the line)

   Someone who checked us in said, wait here hor, elevator spoil. Ah, the sweet sounds of Singlish and Singapore English (two different things).

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     Adrianna Tan (skinnylatte@hachyderm.io)'s status on Saturday, 03-May-2025 12:02:47 JST Adrianna Tan

     in reply to

     The whole thing was very efficient, it would only be surprising if it wasn’t.

     I’ve only been to the consulate twice: once when I came as tourist and had my stuff stolen (they helped me out, and gave me instant noodles), and more recently to get my new passport.

     People were talking: what do you do here? Tech, lol.

     Almost every single one of us. There was a single chef.

     Afterwards, we went for Democracy Dimsum at Harborview (one of the only dimsum places I bother with). My friend and I spoke of the imposter syndrome we felt, learning to cook our home food while we are here, because we just can’t get the things we crave precisely.

     I said, whenever I think ‘I can’t cook like the old Asian auntie, I remind myself I AM that Asian auntie’.

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     Adrianna Tan (skinnylatte@hachyderm.io)'s status on Saturday, 03-May-2025 12:08:06 JST Adrianna Tan

     in reply to

     Sometimes, I really miss talking to people from Singapore, Malaysia, Indonesia, India, other places I have lived. Not because I want to feel any specific cultural connection, but because.. I realize that in America, I don’t speak AT ALL about the rest of the world, with people who aren’t immigrants. Sure there are privileged people who travel, but I don’t really feel any deep engagement about the going ons about the other places I have called home.

     I miss the rest of the world so terribly.

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     Adrianna Tan (skinnylatte@hachyderm.io)'s status on Saturday, 03-May-2025 12:10:17 JST Adrianna Tan

     in reply to

     There’s a world in which these other places are places I don’t have to explain. Where I just exist in those spaces. Where I don’t have to define myself as who I am not.

     Here, my immigrant identity is front and center in everything that I do. That’s tiring. Sometimes I just want to shoot the breeze and talk about ghost stories with people from the places I have called home. Where we seem to have a shared vocabulary and love for the things we know: food, family, social expectations.

     And I am never needing to explain anything about anything.

     I am always explaining, here.

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     Adrianna Tan (skinnylatte@hachyderm.io)'s status on Saturday, 03-May-2025 12:15:30 JST Adrianna Tan

     in reply to

     It almost feels as if I have all these limbs I cannot feel.

     A few years ago, I had a complication of a disease I had for a long time, and one of the symptoms was I would suddenly lose feeling and control of some of my limbs. It was awful.

     Today, that’s over, but my immigrant journey, and being in the ‘wrong’ side of the world, feels like a fissure, a split from my deep sense of self and identity.

     I have such a deep love for Singapore, Malaysia, Indonesia and India. Being separated from those places feels like I can’t breathe, sometimes.

     And yet, in order for me to exist as a queer person, I had to voluntarily make this split. And now I have all of these phantom limbs that I’m reminded of, randomly. I move about the world like a chameleon where you’ll never really guess where I’m from (I’m autistic), but my original self, my whole self, is much closer to the equator.

     I have not been able to see her.

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     Yvonne Lam (yvonnezlam@mastodon.social)'s status on Sunday, 04-May-2025 08:00:31 JST Yvonne Lam

     in reply to

     @skinnylatte I keep meaning to ask if you've read Zen Cho's The Order of the Pure Moon Reflected in Water, and your thread reminded me of it again:

     https://zencho.org/books/the-order-of-the-pure-moon-reflected-in-water/

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     Adrianna Tan (skinnylatte@hachyderm.io)'s status on Sunday, 04-May-2025 08:00:31 JST Adrianna Tan

     in reply to

     • Yvonne Lam

     @yvonnezlam I have not. The Malayan emergency is a period of personal and academic interest for me, so thank you