Last night, my Chinese American friend and I were talking about how some places just call to us. Penang island is like that for me. I grew up here, and so did my parents. My ancestors have been here for nearly two centuries. It is here that I can slip into my mother tongue, a Hokkien variant only found in Northern Malaysia.
I feel like I am finally home, where nobody will accuse me of not being “Chinese enough” because I can’t speak Cantonese or Mandarin well enough.
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Elizabeth Tai 
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