Diphthongs

[SimL]

BTW, just out of curiosity: what was the nationality of people in Malaysia during British rule? Were they ever considered British?

I don't know the full details. As far as I understand from my family history interviews, people like my father (Baba, born in Penang, from a family of many generations living there) were considered "British subjects"; as were his parents (also both born in Penang). In contrast, people like my mother (Sin-Khek, born *in Malaya*, but outside of the Straits Settlements, from a family which had only arrived in the 1910's) were considered "British projected persons"; her own parents, both born in China, were simply considered Chinese citizens ("resident aliens", in modern terminology).

To that extent (i.e. as "British subjects" and "British projected persons"), they were, I suppose, considered "British".

In both cases, I've no idea whether they were considered British citizens, with (for example) the right to just pack their bags and go and live in England. I've no idea if they were entitled to go and live in any other part of the British empire either.

Given the "problem" which the rich, developed countries have nowadays of people from poorer countries trying to get in, you'd have thought that from 1850 to 1940, if people in Asia had rights as "British citizens" (or "French citizens", "Belgian citizens", "Spanish citizens", etc), they would have moved in much greater numbers to England (France, Belgium, Spain, etc). But perhaps that's only from the modern perspective: 1. Where we have TV and films and media to show how rich these countries are, and 2. Where globalization has meant that cultures have grown much closer together. Perhaps people in Asia in those days: 1. Didn't know so much much about the other places, so they never thought that much about going to live there, and 2. Even if they did know about the other places, those places might have been so different that very few people would have wanted to go and live there.

[As an example of "1. Didn't know so much much about the other places".

When my mother flew to England for her higher education in the mid 1950's, it was a propeller plane, which had to stop 3-4 times for refuelling along the way, and the whole trip took 2 days. When my parents frew back from England after my father's second degree in the early 1960's, everyone (including the little children) wore a tie specially for the flight. BOAC (as it was called then) would have been the only airline covering that route, and there was probably only 1 flight a week from KL to London.

As an example of "2. Those places might have been so different".

Even in the 1970's, when we got to Australia, there were NO Chinese provisions in the supermarket - soy sauce was unknown to the general population, let alone woks, or stir-fry or sushi. One couldn't buy curry powder anywhere in Darwin, the only curry we could get was a sort of curry paste in tins, from a specialist "Asian grocery". All you could get for lunch in the centre of town as a hotdog, a hamburger, a sausage roll, a pie or a vegetable pasty. That was it. Having a piece of meat with any sort of European sauce would have been considered *high culinary culture*. Absolutely no one I knew in school (including people from "upper-class" and "professional" families) would have had wine with their meal (not even once a month). Even "Spaghetti Bolognaise" was considered slightly exotic.

My examples are all based on food, but the "pure Anglo-Saxonness" of Australia (and that applied to the whole of Australia outside of central Sydney and Melbourne) could be extended to every other aspect of society.]

That's how different even the 1950's and 1960's were, compared to nowadays. The gap for 1850-1950 would have been many times greater.

So - when you knew so little about a place, and the place you might migrate to is so different, even if you knew something about it - perhaps a lot of people never thought of migrating, even if they were legally entitled to do so.

But yes, the matter deserves more investigation.

[FutureSpy]

@Yeleixingfeng
真島 and 眞島 are both pronounced as まじま (Majima). The point is that two days ago I got a relative to send me a copy of a 戸籍 (family registry) from that side of my family, and the kanji was written with the upper part of the former and the bottom of the latter. I'm attaching an image file with the character (or at least my attempt to reproduce it). 真 is the form that made its way into standardized 常用漢字 (jouyou kanji). People refer to 眞 as 旧字 (old character) or 異体字 (character variant). Some argue 真 and 眞 weren't quite the same, but at least in modern Japanese they're the same tho.

Thanks, Sim!
I looked for the "British subjects" article on Wikipedia (not the most reliable source, but still...) and found it rather confusing. Now as for "British projected person", did you mean "protected" instead? If so, here's what Wikipedia says about them:

The inhabitants of these former states were never automatically entitled to became British subjects or citizens but were given the status of British Protected Person instead.

Sounds like a very obscure status, as they were neither considered Malaysians citizens neither British citizens. I'll try to read more about it from other sources later...

[SimL]

Hi FutureSpy,

My god, I wrote "British projected person" twice . (Actually, probably cut-and-paste.). Yes, definitely, ""British protected person". Damn! I hate it when I have typos in my text!

[amhoanna]

We never mixed with the Malays well enough - there is always a barrier.

Such a shame to have a barrier like that. It's always a shock to go to West M'sia and feel the mutual disgust btw Sino and Malay. From what I understand, the non-mixing began during the British era, and then actually seemed to escalate during the 70s, 80s and 90s as the Malays fell under the sway of the Wahhabis, and the Sinos fell under the sway of the State machinery of China both directly and through Singapore (esp. in Johor, Melaka, etc.).

I better go, I need to go get ready to jip hoan 入番.