Selina Siak Chin Yoke > Quotes

“Temper in a woman is only tolerated, never celebrated.”
― Selina Siak Chin Yoke, The Woman Who Breathed Two Worlds

“Inside my soul there echoed the cry of a hundred elephants dying.”
― Selina Siak Chin Yoke, The Woman Who Breathed Two Worlds

“My two worlds were alive: Chinese and Malay rolled into one, blended by the centuries that had passed.”
― Selina Siak Chin Yoke, The Woman Who Breathed Two Worlds

“Throughout, Mother ran in and out like a mare untethered.”
― Selina Siak Chin Yoke, The Woman Who Breathed Two Worlds

“Her ancestors would fight for her spirit, but so too would the white devils who had come to rule. They had taken first our land and then our souls.”
― Selina Siak Chin Yoke, The Woman Who Breathed Two Worlds

“We should have no problem finding you a husband - provided you don't become known as a dragon.”
― Selina Siak Chin Yoke, The Woman Who Breathed Two Worlds

“Instinct told me that men didn't like wives cleverer than them. Even my beloved Peng Choon, wonderful husband that he was, liked to think of himself as the smarter of us two, which for the sake of peace I allowed. What he said told me all I needed to know - 'Ai-yahh! That is rubbish-lah! You talk just like a woman!', as if talking like a woman were such a terrible affliction.”
― Selina Siak Chin Yoke, The Woman Who Breathed Two Worlds

“It was the bicycle which allowed the Japanese Imperial Army to do what everyone else had said was impossible: traverse virgin jungle.”
― Selina Siak Chin Yoke, When the Future Comes Too Soon

“Years later, after Japan had already been rebuilt and had begun sending their wretched cars and electrical goods to our country, I took care never to give them my business. Life would have been easier if I’d bought one of their damned television sets or even their fridges, but I always thought of Hashimoto. I remembered my humiliation and refused to yield. I have never knowingly bought a Japanese product. Not one.”
― Selina Siak Chin Yoke, When the Future Comes Too Soon

“her”
― Selina Siak Chin Yoke, The Woman Who Breathed Two Worlds

“When there is ugliness all around, we must remind ourselves that beauty exists in this world.”
― Selina Siak Chin Yoke, When the Future Comes Too Soon

“Even my beloved Peng Choon, wonderful husband that he was, liked to think of himself as the smarter of us two, which for the sake of peace I allowed.”
― Selina Siak Chin Yoke