English/Swiss | Chinese
My Mum is half-English, half-Swiss, and my Dad is from mainland China. I predominantly grew up in Cambridge, which is quite English but has a significant international population, but we visited Switzerland every summer as children. I also spent a few years of my childhood in Singapore, which is very cosmopolitan and opened up my eyes, ears and taste buds to Asian cultures. I learned some Mandarin at the time and then lived for a year in Shanghai when I was 18, studying Mandarin. This really helped me connect with the Chinese part of my family and heritage. We used to celebrate all the festivals, which was really fun; German Christmas (with real candles on the tree and German carols), Chinese New Year, Swiss National Day etc. English has always been our main language at home, but French, German and Mandarin make regular appearances through relatives and friends. One of my mum's friends recently said to me: You're not half-anything. You are double-heritage. The Classical music world, which has always been a big part of my life, is generally very far behind in terms of diversity, especially in the UK. The ‘hostile environment’ and the anti-immigrant narrative around the Brexit vote has also had a big impact around the rise of hate crimes and what one might call ‘confident racism’, people emboldened to express their prejudices openly. That has been challenging to deal with. I’m a professional opera singer and composer and growing up across cultures has meant being exposed to so many different kinds of music at a young age, from Gamelan in Singapore through English choral music to reggae and electronic music. I love being mixed-race and feel privileged to have connections with lots of different cultures and places. I really enjoy travelling and have found that being mixed-race is welcomed in certain cultures these days. I often get mistaken for a local in lots of different places, from Colombia to India, which is quite fun! I was born in the year of the tiger in the Chinese Zodiac, so would love to return as a white tiger, in the wild. A Chinese dragon would be quite cool too, though.
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