My Sydney years

G'day matey. I know... it is corny... I spent 5 years of my youth studying in Sydney. Why Sydney you might ask... haha I didn't choose it because it had the best university or anything vaguely academic, I choose it because I read that it was the 2nd gayest city in the world, the 1st being SFO. I visited SFO when I was 17 and I loved the city but it was such a loooong flight from Sg that I decided to study in Sydney instead. I also had fond memories of Ozzieland from my childhood trips to the theme parks on the Gold Coast. So yeah, I choose to study in Sydney because it was gay and I wanted a gay awakening! Leaving Changi with my parents was a mixbag of emotions. I recall shedding a few tears as I enter the departure hall at Changi as the whole extended family was there to see me off. I was also excited yet afraid of what lies ahead.

5 years went by in a whirlwind and I came to love alot about Sydney and Australia in general. It allowed me to come out to myself and actually have a circle of good gay and straight friends. I guess when you are all alone in a foreign land, you tend to make a greater effort with friendships and a social life. One of my dearest friend I actually met during the first day of class at uni and I didn't know he was gay until one fateful night on oxford street. haha it was quite a coincidence indeed but we had great fun during the time we had in sydney. Another good friend came about through a weird attempt by another friend to set us up but we ended up good friends, although we have sorta lost touch since I came back to sg. We both had our virgin experience visiting a gay sauna together. It was a night of petrifying trepidation as I could recall!

Sydney was a blast. We spent many a nights getting pissed on Oxford Street. Everyone was so open about their sexuality and there was no inhibitions about being gay. I was never outlandish gay or out there though. I guess I brought a certain level of Sg conservatism with me to Sydney as I was never comfortable showing to others that I was gay either through my dressing or my mannerism. However, I will never forget my first Mardi Gras experience. That sense of solidarity and pride, it nearly brought a tear to my eye as I saw gay people holding hand in hand marching down a major city road with cheering crowds on the side.

Sydney was great fun and Australians in general are a bunch of great people. However, I never really felt like I could ever be an Australian per se. I was different and although Aussies in general are not a racist bunch, I always felt that there is always a latent level of racism that prevails against Asian people in general. It is not something that I fault them on though coz most cultures in the world are xenophobic in nature. Japanese people frown upon foreigners as do the Chinese. It is just how people by their very nature respond to something that is foreign and unfamilar to them. I don't support racism but I accept that as a tribal facet of life. Even many of my fellow singaporeans holds pretty racist views. Plus I will add that I never got any racist attacks in Sydney. It was just a sense of feeling different and the understanding that because of this, you will never really be accepted as part of the tribe per se. And for me, that was something which bugs me.

At the end of my studies, I had to make the difficult decision whether to stay on in Sydney or head back to Singapore. It was not a easy choice. Even till today, I am constantly asking myself where do I see myself in the future. I love both cities but eventually made the decision to come back home to Singapore. I was seeing an Aussie guy at that time and part of the decision to return was tied to the relationship. Coming back to Singapore has been a rude awakening as so much of what I was used to in Sydney was no longer possible here. The freedom of uni life, no more boozing over the weekends, no more drives to the national parks or beaches, no more gayness so to speak ... it's not all bad, I am back home with family. Living in a city with many cute asian bois and the fun nightlife of bangkok only a 2 hour Tiger airway flight away... so I am not really complaining. It is a different life to what I led in Sydney. Not better, not worse. Just different.