The area where I grew up in Perth wasn’t very multicultural, and when we arrived from Singapore in the mid-70s, I think it was the Asians’ turn to get bullied. Within the first few weeks we got a letter in the letterbox saying, 'You dirty Asians, why don’t you fuck off.' I remember my parents reading it out to us. That was our welcome.
I was also the only Asian kid in my primary school. And the questions were like, ‘Do you speak English? Can you do kung fu?’ But those kids were just curious. They weren . . .