Sarah Benjamin Huang: “Growing up, everyone called me angmoh all the time throughout my entire childhood and adolescence. Even though I grew up in a house where we spoke Mandarin at home, everyone on the outside was telling me that I was angmoh and I said, “Fine, I’m angmoh, I will leave this place.” I felt that since I’m not wanted here, I’m gonna leave.
I feel very Singaporean but I never felt like other people felt that I was Singaporean enough for them. We understand Singaporeanness as Chinese, Malay or Indian. But what if you don’t fit neatly into those categories?
When I was growing up, people were very obsessed about breaking me down into fractions. My dad said you’re not one quarter or one half of something, you’re just British, Chinese, Jewish, Peranakan – and you’re all those things at the same time. One identity does not diminish another. I do feel British too – there are parts of British culture I identify very strongly with. I can feel that way and I can also feel like a Hokkien girl. I can swear in Hokkien, speak a bit of Malay, eat Peranakan food all at the same time – none of these things diminish the other!”
Huang, a content creator, food host, and director of Ethnographica, shares about embracing her Singaporean identity as a person with mixed heritage, plus: *Hakka history and cuisine* *Her hawker research* *Who defines Singaporean food/ Singaporeanness?* *How her mixed heritage is reflected through the food she cooks* *Is globalization and food cultures becoming more homogeneous a good or bad thing?*
42: Coming to grips with the ‘rojak’ nature of Singapore’s people and its food | Sarah Benjamin Huang, content creator, food host, and director of Ethnographica