1994: Alor Setar, Malaysia

Los Angeles to Kuala Lumpur was a long long flight.

Stopped at Taipei for refueling, I had a coca-cola in the airport lounge. "Coca Cola" was written in Chinese on that coke can, and that made me realise that I was now in Asia.

It was May 1994 when I landed Kuala Lumpur for the first time. But I had only one hour in Kuala Lumpur, as I had to take another domestic flight to get to my boyfriend's hometown, Alor Setar. I was travelling with only two suitcases which were all my belongings except for some books I shipped separately.

Alor Setar is the capital city of the Kedah State, but it was still very local, "kampong", place in Malaysia. It was a tiny little airport and the outside the airport was mainly paddy fields.

My boyfriend, his parents, and brother and sister came to pick me up with a small bouquet of flower. They were kind and greeted me with full of affection.

We went to his house where his parents and second brother's family lived together. My boyfriend had two elder brothers and one elder sister. They were all married except for the eldest brother, who had a steady girlfriend and lived in Penang Island.

His second brother had a young daughter. She was three years old and called NgaNga as nickname. She was such a cute girl and was curious about me, a complete stranger to her.

So I stayed with the family until both my boyfriend and I found the job in Kuala Lumpur. Although it was deadly hot everyday, his father believed the air-cond was not good for health therefore there was no air-cond in the house.

I hardly slept at night because the ceiling fan was not enough for 35-37 degrees weather. Even at night, it was above 30 degrees.

Mosquitoes found me a delicious new flavored blood, and one time I had more than 20 bites on my legs.

There was no hot water for shower either. There was a hot water tank, but it was not turned on because everyone thought it was not necessary. They thought it was hot enough to take a cold shower. Though I did not agree, I had no choice but to follow the rest.

When in Rome, do as the Romans do.

With much straggle, I tried to comply with the new life style in Alor Setar. After all, I was a short term guest.

My boyfriend's mother was old Chinese lady who spoke no English. Though his father and brother spoke good English as they do shoe retail business in the centre of Alor Setar, all the ladies including NgaNga did not speak English. So most of the conversation at home was carried out in Cantonese which I did not speak at all.

However his mother was a kind, hard-working lady. She washed cloths without using the washing machine, though there was one in the house. Using electricity seems to be such a waste. She was a great cook as well.

Meals she cooked were all excellent, but I could not eat so much, mostly because of the heat. But she worried that I do not eat much because I do not like her food, so that she insisted me to eat more.

I tried. I think I was eating as much as I normally do, but that did not please her enough.

Then my boyfriend turned to me and told me to eat more. I told him that is not possible, but he said I MUST eat to please his mother.

I resented.

We had fights over such stupid topics over and over. In the family, my boyfriend was the youngest boy and most beloved. He was always a good boy and studied hard to please his parents. He wanted to show off his family what a wonderful girlfriend he brought from US. His attitude towards my eating his mother's meal became a serious stress and I went to see a doctor once. I developed a stomach trouble.

I looked at the return ticket to Los Angeles many times. I wanted to go back to Fresno as David told me: He said if I can't stand the life in Malaysia, just come back to Fresno no matter what. The ticket was still valid. The prices of single and return ticket were almost the same, so I bought one year open ticket just in case.

But I did not go back as a tourist and become illegal alien. I only had $1,400 with me. I could not rely on friends just because I did not like Malaysia much.

Three months later, my boyfriend and I moved to Kuala Lumpur to stay with his cousin to find the permanent jobs. He decided working in Alor Setar or Penang was not a good idea.

I thought of working in a Hotel or Air Line industries because there would be Japanese guests, and they would like to have a Japanese person to attend them. Doing the business with the Japanese, the language is always a barrier, so that I had an advantage.

From Alor Setar, I applied to Shangri-la Hotel Kuala Lumpur as I found the newspaper ad to look for a Japanese Guest Relation Officer. I wrote a CV and sent to the hotel HR dept. There was an instant reply and they wanted to interview me in Kuala Lumpur.

In the painful three months, I became close to NgaNga, so it was very sad to leave her. She called me "Yappun CheChe", means "Japanese sister". I loved her very much but I had to move on. I could not live in the small town of Alor Setar anymore.

When we departed, my boyfriend's father gave me a small wallet with RM100. He was always kind and supportive to me. I appreciated, and left the house for good.

A Midsummer Night's Dream

So, at last I reached where I can study psychology.

In California State University, Fresno, I was enrolled with several psychology classes: Introduction to Counseling, Child Psychology, Cognitive Psychology, etc. Registering those classes was such an exciting moment.

Meanwhile, after a brief stay at an old Japanese lady's house during a break, I moved to another studio apartment near CSU Fresno. This unit was designed to share a kitchen with the neighbour, but you had a complete privacy in your own room. As students do not use much of the kitchen, it was quite comfortable and reasonable that way.

I met new friends in CSU Fresno.

Some came from Malaysia and I started seeing one of Malaysian Chinese who also worked in one of the Japanese restaurant. The other Korean boyfriend I had from Bakersfield moved on to other Korean girl and also moved to Los Angeles.

It is a bit funny that I never dated anyone from Japan or US. Though I had several close friends, it never happened as I anticipated.

And for some reason, I made a very close friend who also lived in the same apartment lot and he was from Kuwait via London where his family lived. He, I call him Al here, was a gay who never had any interest in women whole his life except for Madonna. I liked him a lot and we hang around together like closest girlfriends. He came from a wealthy family: he loved Jean-Paul Gaultier and dressed smart all the time.

With him and two other Malaysian girls were the gang, and we often spent evening together.

And one day, Al confessed he was HIV positive did not think he would live long.

At that time he was 21 years old. Being young, cool, and stylish, there was no sign of illness in him. I had a hard time accepting the fact.

By the middle of the first quarter in CSU Fresno, I discovered that my family back in Japan can't send any tuition this year as my father's business got into a problem and so was my mother. Trying to help father out, my mother became a guarantor to his loan, now his debt was on her as well.

The tuition fee for the foreign students was very high. I managed to earn enough for living expenses, but that is never enough to pay for the tuition.

So helpless and depressed, I walked towards the registration office in CSU Fresno. I had no choice but to withdraw all the classes because I could not pay.

F-1 student visa expires if you are not enrolled full-time. Not only that I had to withdraw all the classes I finally managed to register, but also I had to leave US in a few months.

My part-time restaurant employer was a successful and kind Japanese gentleman, and he offered me an option. His friend in San Fransisco could hire me but without a legal permit.

Though I was tempted, I did not want to be a illegal alien and live like a criminal. I thanked him for kind help, but I decided to leave US if I had to.

I called Embassy of Japan to find out if there was any scholarship offered by Japanese government or charity organisation. The lady picked up the phone told me off there was no such thing.

The scholarship in California was limited to the residents at least for the undergraduate. There really was no one to seek help. It was probably one of the most bitter moment of my life. I was helpless 22 years old with no degree (except AA from Bakersfield College) and no proper working experience. No green card or right to work. Though I loved living in Fresno, I could not stay there anymore.

It happened to be the time for my Malaysian boyfriend and other friends to finish school and go back to Malaysia for good. He asked me if I wanted to come with him and see if I could find the job there. My friends said that the economy in Malaysia was booming and it would a good time to go there.

But I had no idea where or what kind place Malaysia was. My American friends were all worried because they also had no idea and did not sound like it was a wise thing to do. I was scared too. Malaysia is an Islamic country and I was not sure if a foreign woman like me can survive there.

The other choice was to go back to Japan and save enough money to come back to Fresno. But both Japan and US were under the recession and there was no guarantee that I can earn enough money to come back soon...or to find a good job in the first place.

So I made the decision. Let me go to Malaysia and see what's up there. If there is a good job, fine, I shall come back to US with enough savings. If not, then I would finally give up and go back to Japan as the last resort.

My boyfriend went back to Malaysia first to explain his family about me. As we planned to live with his family until we find the jobs, so he needed time to speak to his family - a typical Chinese family, he said - to accept me.

The day before I finally left Fresno, I spent the whole day with Al. We talked a lot...we cried together and we promised to see each other again in future.

At that time, Madonna's "I Remember" was popular. He said he would always remember me when he listened that song.

I too remember him every time I listen to that song.

From Malaysia I wrote to him once or twice, but he did not somehow reply to me. I was too scared to call the number in London and Kuwait he gave me, because his family might give me the worst news I fear. So until this day, I lost in touch with him. But I remember his friendship and miss him very much.

I took Greyhound from Fresno to Los Angeles. Looking at the window, the bus passed the familiar scenery of the city of Fresno. I cried silently. I felt indignation with my fate.

And I swore that when I come back here one day, I come back legally with enough fund to support myself. I swore that I would never be helpless again: I will take over the control over my life.

My university life as a psych major had vanished as if it was a midsummer night's dream.

But I still had a hope. I knew things could not go worse than this. It could only get better, not worse.

Part-time Jobs and Graduation Ceremony

In both Bakersfield and Fresno, I did varieties of part-time jobs. Unlike my other rich-foreign-student friends, I had no choice but to work to pay my bills.

I clearly remember my monthly expense total. It was $600 including rent, utilities, food, gas, and other personal expenses. I would not have survived in San Fransisco or Los Angeles, but it was somehow possible in Bakersfield and Fresno. The rent was only 250 to 300.

The first dollar I earned in US was from doing ushering in Bakersfield College stadium during the football match. The American football, of course. As I get to watch the game for free, I learned the rules of the American football at the same time.

But what I did mostly was a waitress in Japanese restaurants. I knew the menu, and knew the language if the Japanese guests came, and a Japanese waitress' presence made the restaurant look more authentic. They also provided a meal after work. Having a free dinner several times a week was a big advantage.

There is no custom to give a tip in Japan, so that I never earned a tip until I went to California. Customers gave 10-15% tips from the bill, and actually the tip kept me going to cover the daily expenses rather than the hourly pay of the minimum wage $7.25 per hour at that time.

Besides waitress, I did a part-time tutor for French, Japanese, and English.

Yes, French...I completely forgot everything now, but I was taking French classes in Bakersfield and somehow I was a top student in that class. So I was introduced to teach a junior-high boy at $10 per hour, but he was too young and so I was, and it did not work out. I always loved being taught and I still do, but I never made a good teacher.

Teaching Japanese seemed a lot easier. I had sessions with a gentleman who was so willing to learn the language, but finding a good textbook was not very easy in Fresno at that time. He just wanted to know the basic conversation, but teaching the very basic of your own language requires a lot of patience than other languages. I think I was a lousy teacher there too.

In one occasion, a friend introduced me a tutor job to teach English to a Japanese high school girl who was in Bakersfield and was staying with a local family. So I went to their house to teach her English several times because she could not communicate with the family though the entire purpose for her being there was to learn English and culture from them.

The host family's house was at the edge of Bakersfield and looked quite shabby. It seemed that earning extra income by accepting foreign students was the sole reason of them to have her in the house. The Japanese girl looked younger than her age and so vulnerable. She also looked lonely and lost. I do not know if my English lessons ever helped her at all, but she went back to Japan a few months later anyways. I realised not everyone enjoys living in US.

In Fresno, I did a house-keeping too. In my speech class, one of the other student was a retired lady, and she felt sorry for my situation and hired me to help her clean the house.

It was a beautiful house and I worked seriously, but I do not think I was any good as a house-keeper either.

So here are the lessons learned from my part-time jobs: I make OK as a waitress, but NG as a teacher and house-keeper.

Another thing I learned was that I can somehow survive with whatever I do. Though it was very financially tight situation, I never had to ask money from anybody back in Japan for living expenses. Well, even if I wanted, I did not have anyone to turn to anyways.

But I was rather proudly independent in Fresno. Young and independent...cool.

In one time I did not speak Japanese for nearly six months, and I forgot what to say on the phone when I called mother. My English seemed to have improved. Still keeping As from the classes except for English literature (B) and Calculus (C).

Oh, I hated Calculus and I still do. I spent one summer only doing Calculus full-time, but I never got it. It is such an irony that I married a man who loves Calculus and Physics than any other subjects. Those are the two subjects I never appreciated.

After one semester in Fresno City College, I graduated from Bakersfield College with honors. The Class of 1993. I was happy attending the graduation ceremony with honors' yellow belt, but no one managed to attend it from my family. My mother could not afford to fly, and I do not recall why my uncle did not bother to drive from Los Angeles. Anyhow, a few friends attended the ceremony for me, and I was happy enough with that.

Now I secured the minimum AA degree, so that I transferred to Cal State Fresno.

At long last, I started taking real psychology classes I always wanted to study. It was a long way from the time I experienced the first illogical bullying in junior high. I was so ready and excited to learn everything about psychology.

Beginning of the Journey: The World of Star Trek the Next Generation

In Fresno, I found a small studio room on the garage of the house near Fresno City College. As I had a few more classes to complete to earn AA from Bakersfield College, I attended Fresno City College for a semester.

The studio was a cute room. A very small kitchen and a tiny shower room, but that was the first room I had for all by myself.

In the main house, there lived three all-American boys: James, David, and Mark. They were all around my age, and they also attended the same college which was a walking distance.

James' father owned the house, and David, Mark, and I rented a room each and shared the living room in the house. They were all pleasant and kind guys.

James was sensitive and caring, and David was tall (at least 6.3 feet) and kind, and Mark was... a Trekker.

Being a poor student who was barely surviving each week, I did not have extra money for entertainment. So I watched many movies on HBO and rental videos during college years. With occasional movies in theatres, I think I was watching nearly 20 movies a week including re-run. By the time of Oscar nominees announcement, I watched all the nominated movies and discussed with friends which one would win Oscar.

But most of all, Mark rented me the series of Star Trek: the Next Generation. He had the entire series (the season 5 was on that time), so I had the privilege to watch it from the first episode on his VHS.

And I LOVED IT, and love it intensely until today.

Though I liked the original series, it was not like that. I loved the world of Captain Picard, Data, Number One, Dianna, Wolf, and the entire Federation.

If I were born in the 24th century, I would have been a Star Fleet officer for sure.

So my everyday life in Fresno was like this: study, Star Trek TNG, and other movies. Also I played basketball with my housemates. We told David not to jump at all...there was no way to shoot when he was in front of any of us.

When I told them about the tragic incident in Bakersfield. They were very surprised to hear that I knew all the suspects in person. I remember James said,

"Yukiko, don't worry. We don't play Dungeons and Dragons."

Tragedy

After living in the dorm for a year, I moved out to the apartment with a friend from the college choir and her boyfriend. We shared two bedroom apartment near school.

My friend, Debby, was about the same age as me, and she had cute little chubby figure with beautiful blond hair. She was a few people who were kind to me in the mostly local students' choir.

To pay for own living expenses, I was working in a Japanese restaurant in town as a waitress. After coming back from work in the evening, Debby's boyfriend sometimes brought his friends to play Dungeons & Dragons and I met them in the living room.

There were three boys: I can't recall their names, but they were 18, 19, and 20 years old and some of them were also attending Bakersfield College. They liked the role playing game, and we talked about general things (like recent movies or events) while we were enjoying ordinal weekday evening together.

There was nothing extraordinary until Debby and I heard that one of the boys parents were killed at home.

We were confused. We were worried that they got into any trouble when we heard that all three boys went missing.

A bit by bit the information came in.

We learned that not only the boy's parents but his brother and sister were also killed with a gun and knife. And it was told that the boys were the suspects.

Why, was the first question. Why would they have to do such things? Is that true? Those boys in our living room could be the suspects of such crime?

Though we prayed hard otherwise, they were the real suspects of such a horrendous crime.

Later, they called Debby's boyfriend asking for money. They took only $150 from the crime scene and ran away to Mexico. Naturally they ran out of money.

Debby's boyfriend called the police, and they went to the restaurant in San Diego pretending to give money. The boys were captured so easily there.

The boys' faces were the top page of the following morning newspaper. They were the youngest homicide suspects in the Kern County.

Debby's boyfriend had no choice but to call the police as Debby was pregnant at that time. He wouldn't take a risk to put her and baby in danger.

As a part of witness protection exercise, they moved out from California not to get traced by the boys and their families. I have not heard from Debby ever since.

At that time I was also planning to move to Fresno, because I knew that I would not be able to afford UCLA, my dream school, and my boyfriend at that time also moved there by chance. Cal State Fresno looked a good alternative to UCLA because Cal State Bakersfield was a bit too small as a university. Foreign students tuition was much cheaper in Cal State Universities than in UC schools.

In the second year, I no longer received the living expense from my parents like the first year, and I was supporting all my expenses. I was hoping at least the school tuition would be sponsored by my father, but it completely stopped shortly after I arrived Fresno as he himself got into financial problems. Later I learned his company filed bankruptcy around that time.

There was a tragedy for my friends and for myself in 1992.

Breaking Ice: Power of Music

When your English skill is limited, it is not easy to make friends.

It was not an easy experience to get to know people in the college dorm while you can barely listen to people to understand where the conversation is going, not able to tell what you think about the topics.

It was like a watching ping-pong game at the beginning...looking at the people speaking one after another, quietly.

All the girls in the dorm were between 18 to 20 some years old, and they speak fast. You also do not know what they are talking about if you never watched the particular TV programme or movie which is the topic of the conversation.

But I found the tool to break ice.

There was a piano in the dorm living room.

Besides the piano lessons I was taking when I was in kindergarten, I self-studies some music on piano. So that I played simple ones like Richard Clayderman and For Elise.

That music I played created something to talk about, and it worked as a real ice-breaker.

There were variety of students in the dorm: My roommate was from Hawaii, others from NY, Alaska, and Paris. Some blacks, some whites, and one Asian (me)...as the time went by, we became good friends.

Another music I enjoyed was a College Choir.

When I took a Voice Class to fulfill the liberal arts requirements, the pianist of the class recommended me to take the Concert Choir class which had one hour lesson every day.

It was over 60 students in the choir with full 8 voice parts. I became the second soprano and only foreign student in the choir.

It was such a wonderful experience. The choir sang very classic gospels in Latin, German, and English, or sometimes the medley of Beauty and the Beast. We went to the concerts in the churches around the cities in California like Santa Barbara.

When you are lonely, it was always the music which helped me and stood by me.

There was one concert away from Bakersfield. The audiences were mostly elder people in that city who loved classic choir music. After we finished all the music of the day, one old lady approached me and said,

"I watched you perform very beautifully. It was so wonderful."

There was no solo part and I was one of the many sopranos, so I wondered what impressed that lady so much, but I was very grateful and thanked her for the comment. Being the only foreigner in the choir was actually not so easy. But that lady's comment saved my day and my entire year in the choir.

Music helped me to communicate people better, and it also supported me to gather myself during the tough moment.

Without piano and singing, I would have made much fewer friends during the first year in Bakersfield. I believe in the power of music, and I do appreciate it very very much.

But at that time, I didn't dream that I would be working in a music company one day.

From Tokyo to Bakersfield

You normally do not think your hometown is a funny place.

Where you were born is all you know until you move out one day, and you normally love your hometown.

For some reason, I didn't.

Not that I hated Tokyo, but I was never comfortable. I didn't quite fit in.

My friends constantly told me I was a bit strange, or different. As I was just being myself, I didn't know how I was strange or different, but that's what they told me.

There are number of desirable attributes for a desirable young girl there. Dressing in a certain way, making a hair style in a certain way, taking about the TV program in a certain way, and being modest and shy in a certain way, speaking to boys in a certain way, etc.

I thought they were all non-sense and ignored most of them. That seemed have made me a "different" girl who was never popular among boys in school.

So it was such a relief when I went to Bakersfield, California to attend Bakersfield College there and lived in the dorm, and the new friends in the girls dorm told me I was not strange at all.

To be "different" in US, you have to be acutely different from the crowd, not just ignoring the desirable attributes.

It is such an irony that I am a pure Japanese with a typical Japanese look, and yet I was a strange girl in Japan and not in US. At that time my English was much poorer, but still I was not considered "different".

That was the first time ever in my life not being "strange". I thought I finally found a place I can be just myself. I loved my friends in Bakersfield, and I loved my teachers who were all great.

Many years after living outside Japan, I discovered Tokyo was rather a funny place and a bit strange. My other friends who visited Tokyo for the first time tend to have a similar impression. No wonder I was called "strange" at that time.

The study itself was tough. With limited reading and writing English skills, attending normal college classes was a real challenge. It took me two hours to read a page of psychology book which I had to read 20 pages a week.

So I spent all my waking time to read textbooks of all the classes I took. If I do not read them in advance, I could not understand what the professors were saying in the class. My hearing skill was not so good, and the teachers were from all over the US and each had a different accent.

Until I finish high school in Japan, I never really studied. I was a stupid young girl who thought not studying was cool. Somehow I managed above the average scores without studying much, so I continued not studying except for the few days before the term exams.

But now, if I don't study every waking minute, I could not catch up. So all I did was reading, reading, and reading even when my friends were out having fun over the weekends.

Because I finally learned how to study, I start doing very well. In the first term, I got A in every class.

I remember very touching moment with Dr. Whitehouse who was a professor of Introduction of Psychology.

He announced that the last exam and essay paper were required only for those score was not confirmed by the previous exams. Then he announced the students' name who already earned A and said they do not have to take the last exam. My name was in it.

But I was going to major in Psychology and liked his class, so I prepared the paper and came to take the exam well prepared.

Dr. Whitehouse realised that I was there, and he handed me the exam paper and said "Thank you" to me personally.

There were no teachers who ever thanked me for taking an exam. That was one glorious moment in Bakersfield.

First Day: Why Black Sheep

As my other blog is in Japanese and it can be only viewed by those in the Japanese SNS, I thought of writing another one here.

I decided the title of the blog because my uncle once told me I was a black sheep in the family when I told him I wanted to US to study. At that time, I was living in Tokyo where I was born and raised.

He already lived in US for more than 20 years and used to tell me to come over once I became big enough, but both my mother and uncle (I have no father since I was two years old) both opposed the idea. They thought living in US alone is not safe, and that would create a financial burden to my mother.

But I really had to go. Something told me I had to.

To cut the story short, with my deserted father's temporary financial support, I managed to go to the college in California when I was 20 years old.

After I studied and lived in US for three years, my financial situation forced me out of US and I moved to Malaysia. From 1994 to 2006, I lived and worked in Malaysia where I got married and delivered a baby who is now four years old.

But being called a Black Sheep really stuck with me for a long time. I studied and worked hard to prove him wrong. My barely-know-each-other-father also once told me that I could be a secretary or something if I learn a bit of English in US. Yeah, right. A secretary. I have nothing against secretaries, but I knew they were all wrong and I had to prove that.

So I would like to look back what I have done ever since and what I am going to do in near future. I would be happy if anyone happened to read this, whoever and wherever you are.