I don’t usually talk about current events on this blog because this is about books and my love of books. I am in my own safety blanket and that comforts me.

But recently I have this sinking feeling, this act of anger through a noisy crowd because I never expected to speak out over an event that has teared a hole into a community of people that are just like me.

8 people died in Georgia at the end of last week, 6 of them were women and Asian. They were mothers, they had children and they can’t go home anymore.

I know that this happened in America but it’s been happening in the UK as well. This could happen to me, I could be walking home from work and someone would attack me, blame me for a pandemic that I didn’t predict. Someone could even attck my family, my mum, my sister all because of our ethnicity. It just sickens me that someone could easily do this.

I hate pointing the blame at someone because it’s makes me like them. This past year alone has opened a lot of peoples eyes over the horrifying act of racism in our world, how social media can help us join our hands and speak out loud our concerns and wishes. But it doesn’t wash away the act of a crime.

I grew up knowing that I was different than my classmates, and I still see it when I walk around my hometown. As a woman, I have been looked at innapropriately, been asked innapropriate things and I have tried so hard to hide myself because of the fear of them looking at me like that. I still remember a friend hanging out in my home and being horrified over the smell of my Mum’s food, she couldn’t stand it and would hold the room defuser towards her nose.

I wanted to come here and spread the awareness of this act of hate. As I said in the beginning, I don’t usually talk about a topic like this here but I feel like it needs to be said. We have been your friend, your ally, we may have been silent over a sea of other minorities but we still liked to be heard. But enough is enough, I can’t just wake up one morning and wish to be someone else, I have to be myself and that I am proud to be Asian. I am proud to be a Asian British, I love my Mum, my sister and brother (don’t tell them I said that, it will ruin my street cred).

I wrote a poem ages ago and I decided to upload it on Friday, it called Hiding in the Woods (link here). This poem felt very relevent to post this week because of #StopAsianHate but also after the death of Sarah Everard. It’s something I don’t usually do but I thought it would be nice to share it.

There is a post on Harpers Bazaar that I felt it should be mentioned: https://www.harpersbazaar.com/uk/culture/culture-news/a35692226/its-time-we-stopped-downplaying-the-uks-anti-asian-racism/

If you have a story to talk about send a comment, keep the conversation going.