Last official day of my half-term break. Next week, it's back to school.
The good news is that Halloween here is going to be a public holiday because of Diwali/Deepavali, so my parents are taking me somewhere Wednesday night and we're arriving Sunday morning. I'll unfortunately not be online on those days, because my dad would rather die than, and I quote, let me take any electronics on holiday.
I may now be allowed to have a smartphone and a laptop, but my dad is still firm that I don't need to take it on holiday.
Personally, I don't really care if it's a short holiday. If I bring books and there's plenty of activities to do, I'll be too busy or tired to even go on my laptop or phone. What pisses me off is when we go on those long-ass holidays, like three weeks or more than a month, and I can't bring my phone or my laptop. Like, there's nothing to do. And I need to stay connected with my friends.
Anyway. It'll be my birthday, so I'm sure they've got some fun stuff planned. Right? I mean, my mum's on holiday from her school (she's a teacher) but she's in the middle of a burnout or something, so she's not exactly super happy. My dad's still the parent who keeps on top of all my work and performances despite me telling him that I'm okay, but he's super strict when it comes to electronics. Which sucks, because my laptop and I are literally locked in. I adore it.
I even named it. My old MacBook from 2009 was named Bob, but something happened to the screen and it got infected by a virus, so it broke. My knockoff Lenovo with a German keyboard broke in History when I closed it and suddenly it crunched, with bolts and screws literally falling out of it. Not my proudest moment. Now, I have an Asus Chromebook, and before you all start saying that Chromebooks are for poor people, I don't even need a Mac. My Chromebook and I are for life, even when it'll die. It's tiny and cheap and great.
I don't know if it's okay to love a laptop, but hey. It's practically my kid, even if I get pissed at it all the time when the WiFi is acting up or when it won't turn on, because sometimes, it does that. It's a good laptop, and it's cheap. Besides, I'm in middle school. Do I even need a MacBook? The answer is no. Heck, my phone is a Xiaomi, not an iPhone, and my earphones are from the supermarket, not AirPods. My dad has declared that Apple is ass apart from MacBooks and AirPods (he hates iPhones) but since I don't need either a MacBook or AirPods, I have my dad's old phone and a $300 laptop. Hooray for conservative French dads!
If you can't tell that I'm being sarcastic, now is the time to question yourself, because I am being very sarcastic. The number of times I got comments at school asking why I didn't have the latest equipment honestly pisses me off. Why do you even care if I have a Chromebook? No one looks at your laptop. Well, at my school, we have to bring laptops to work, but no one who's sane even cares about what brand your laptop is. It's only the kids who want to show off that keep on saying that they have everything. It's so annoying.
Personally, I don't even mind, but the fact is that private schools are so toxic. Everyone just tries to one-up everyone else, and it's so bad. Like, all my friends have Apple Watches or iPhones or iPads or MacBooks or even all of those except for two. Me and another friend. That's bad, if you can't tell. It's not that they hurt me personally, but they're always showing off. I don't know if that's a big thing in Indian and Chinese cultures, but since all my friends are either Indian or Chinese, probably.
Or maybe it's living in Singapore, a privileged bubble full of trust fund babies and crazy rich Asians. Not even kidding. Sometimes I feel like I seriously don't belong, because how do I? My parents are both teachers, and the only reason we live in Singapore and didn't stay in Hong Kong or better, go to Southampton in the UK instead, was because my dad found a job in a university here. You can't imagine how much me and my mum begged to go to the UK. I mean, it's much closer to France, it's less expensive and it's just full of more normal people. Singapore, being a city/country and the hub of Chinese millionaires, is not exactly my type of crowd.
My mum hates it here. My dad is neutral. I am in between neutral and hating it here.
I'm grateful for being in a good school and being in a safe environment, but it's not real life. And there is no way I'm seeing myself living in Singapore when I'm an adult. The minute I turn 18, I'm hopping on a plane out of here to go to university in the US or the UK. I can't stand Singapore anymore. It's been four years since we've moved, and in no way does it feel like home.
If anyone understands what I mean by not feeling like they belong where they live, you're a real one.
Signing out,
Alex <3
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