LAST week, I launched on my YouTube channel a music video made in collaboration with a former student for an old song, Let It Come, in conjunction with the 10th anniversary of my album Warga (this article will make better sense if you watch the video and read the lyrics).

I wrote the song way back in 1997 while at university in Perth (then a real backwater), and as the title suggests, it’s a rumination of sorts on expectations, and with the benefit of hindsight, economic inequality. When I wrote it, I didn’t have lofty thematic ideas in my head, but was merely emoting how I felt as a 20-year-old with the weight of expectations (my own, my family’s and society’s) on my shoulders. It was on my first-ever album on cassette – a lo-fi release recorded sporadically in 1996-97 with an unplugged cream-coloured Mexican Fender Telecaster (my first and only electric guitar to this day) on my Walkman (remember those?) while sitting cross-legged on the floor in my room.

I had no expectations for the album, merely corresponding with my ex-bandmates back home who mailed me their latest experimental band project’s album, also on cassette. To be honest, I was depressed. Firstly, from trying to figure out what to do musically with my songs, since the band I had envisioned with my friends broke up when I left for my Australian sojourn. I hadn’t begun dating yet, but figured how I felt was akin to breaking up with a girlfriend and finding out that she had settled down with another guy right after.

I would also eventually witness, from a distance, Malaysia changing as the new millennium approached. It was the first time I felt like I was in the wrong place at the wrong time – a theme that would continue to appear in my songs.

You have to put the era into context. Asia was on the brink of the 1997 economic crisis, but Malaysia was pretty “stable” in terms of Mahathirism, with Anwar Ibrahim seemingly in line to take over the helm. Twelve months later, the rug got pulled from under Malaysia’s feet, and the country would change forever politically, and eventually, socially.

There was an increase in democratic participation (and discovering that some parts of the system actually still worked) in the decade plus that followed, as well as conservatism among the middle class of all races, who retreated into their comfort zones to find some semblance of normalcy away from the absurd political squawks. The bogeyman of stereotypes emerged again, and we carried on the project of “othering” ourselves from one another – ironically, as our colonial masters had done.

Where am I getting with this minor, sentimental rant? As mentioned last week, we’re still on the topic of race, stereotype and class, so let me break it down for you:

1. As a middle-class Malay male youth in the age of Mahathirism who lived in the Klang Valley, most people expected me to be on some kind of scholarship and study engineering, since it was accessible to me by default, and return with a steady job for a so-called pious, picket-fence future;

2. As a middle-class Malay male youth in the age of Mahathirism with a college education, most people expected me to join a Malaysian students’ association at university and spend my time abroad in the company of the Malay student community (and Malaysian expats), huddled together eating home-cooked food while pining for home during the cruel winters and Raya; and,

3. As a middle-class Malay male youth in the age of Mahathirism who fancied being a musician, some people expected me to party all night long, losing myself and my morals at nightclubs and bars, immersed in the “budaya kuning” of the West, and maybe, hook up with an Aussie sheila, get a permanent residency and migrate.

None of these happened. We all get lumped into certain race- and class-based stereotypes that even we unwittingly box ourselves into. It’s easier to just follow the script than write your own. I’m glad I had both the good and bad experiences (and privilege), and even grateful for them (like how our “politikus” remind us to be, although not their brand of “gratefulness”). No, I never “lupa diri” even once. In fact, I discovered more about myself and Malaysia, thanks to the clarity that “being away” tends to afford.

Again with the benefit of hindsight, I reconciled with what I was then: a middle-class Malaysian loner trying to figure himself out. I roamed the streets and sidewalks as the sole Asian busker downtown (it paid way better than the typical student job of washing dishes and waiting tables). I was my “other”, informal education outside of academia. I’m still an outsider, and all the better for it. It gives me greater clarity on things.

Am I proud? I don’t think that has ever been the point. What and who we are born as is arbitrary, and I take the words of ustaz with a huge pinch of salt. Pride is something one achieves; it’s not inherited. Am I middle-class or Malaysian first?

Now, I present that question to you, dear patient and attentive reader. Are you defined by your national identity or social class first? Which one shapes your desires and values? Who and what are you? Or should I ask, who and what are you to whom? – June 19, 2020.

* Azmyl Yunor is a touring underground recording artiste, and an academic in media and cultural studies. He has published articles on pop culture, subcultures and Malaysian cultural politics. He adheres to the three-chords-and-the-truth school of songwriting, and Woody Guthrie’s maxim “All you can write is what you see”. He is @azmyl on Twitter.

* This is the opinion of the writer or publication and does not necessarily represent the views of The Malaysian Insight. Article may be edited for brevity and clarity.