'Families All Over the World'

When I was in Delhi for a day in transit to Malaysia, I met up with my internship mentor from this past summer, Aparna. Frankly, I met up with as many coworkers as possible, stopping by the Sehgal Foundation for a whole two hours and greeting everyone I could before I had to take the metro back to the airport and catch my next flight. During this semi-rushed interaction, it wasn’t the game of carrom Aparna and I played, or the cups of scalding, yet soothing coffee we ordered from the stall across the street that I will remember most, but rather something that she mentioned in between sips of the latter liquid:

“You have families all over the world! And you certainly have one here.”

We had been discussing my plan for returning to Malaysia: who I was going to be staying with, what and where I planned to visit—all the finer points of my itinerary. Speaking now, a dozen days after this exchange occurred, I can say with confidence that I have proved the above statement to be true.

For the past five days, I have spent time with four different families, and tomorrow, I will be off to visit another. While the majority of my time here in Malaysia has been spent with my main host family in Segamat, last week I took a train down to Johor Bahru and visited three other families I had spent time with during my exchange program two years ago.

The first, Auntie Rosie and Uncle Patrick, had hosted me during the Christmas and Chinese New Year of 2023 and 2024, respectively. Of all the Malaysian families I have spent time with, they are the only Chinese, and thus my sole window into a different side of Malaysian culture and life. On the Thursday we spent together, we went to their Church, a rented space on the third floor of a multipurpose building, located just above a Mandarin preschool. I had been there once before for a Christmas Eve service, although this time, the space felt much different. All the chairs had been moved to make way for a 76-year-old Chinese auntie, who was there to teach us all how to line dance. After two hours of grapevining to Ed Sheeran’s “Shivers” (amongst other hits) beside a room full of elderly Chinese folks, I believe I have some great insights for any pastors back home looking to liven up their Sunday services.

The next day, Friday, I was with my Auntie Elizabeth and Uncle Milton, where we spent the majority of our time together simply chatting, as well as deciding where to eat. In the morning, we had dim sum, afternoon, biryani, and evening, nasi goreng kampung (village fried rice). In a single day, we had perused our way through the cuisines of each of the major ethnicities present here in Malaysia—Chinese, Indian, and Malay—with each food being just as delicious as the last.

My final day in Johor Bahru was actually spent just across the strait in Singapore with Mr. Kanna and his entire family. We traveled as a troop, the seven of us (four kids, two parents, and myself), and missed our train by less than one minute on the way there and missed our bus by the same minuscule increment when we were heading back. We spent the day visiting Little India, the Changi Airport, and Marina Bay, and enjoyed some excellent tea and ice cream along the way. Aside from getting stuck in immigration on my way back into Malaysia, reminding me once more of the lessons I learned in Sejarah (history) class two years ago (that despite Singapore initially joining the Federation of Malaya, along with Sabah and Sarawak, to become a state in the new nation of Malaysia in 1963, it was expelled in 1965 and has very much been an independent nation ever since, and thus the basis of my brief troubles reentering Malaysia), it was an incredible day!

As I write this now, I have returned to my host family in Segamat—my Appa, Amma, and Akkas (elder sisters)—and am once again reminded of my incredible fortune to call so many people and places my family and home. Be it synchronized dance routines, tasting delicious cuisines, or visiting a new country to see its scenes, each was a beautiful experience that helped to expand my definition of what “family” means.

As luck, or more accurately, my ambitiously packed schedule, would have it, tomorrow I will be off to Sabah to visit another host family of mine. This, again, is but another experience proving the truth behind Aparna’s words: I do have a family wherever I go, and to be considered a son or sibling by so many is an unbelievable blessing.