Who is this Wilful Sunflower??!?!
I'm going to link this in my sidebar as an "About Me" section for the benefit of new people dropping by who might be wondering, "Who is this Wilful Sunflower??!?!". My previous "About Me" page was on my personal website, which disappeared when my host provider suddenly deleted my account without warning. Arrgh!
First of all, I assure you that Sunflower is my "real" name, as real as real can be. *grin*
I'm a Christian, by which I mean (among other things) that I love God and call Him my Father. He and I, we have a relationship. I love Him because He first loved me, even when I didn't know anything about Him. He's never stopped loving me no matter what I've done, and He never will, no matter what I do. Knowing that He loves me has helped me to get through the hard times over the years. Even when I feel all alone, I know that He's actually there with me and that's always made a tremendous difference.
With a name like Sunflower, I'm obviously female - although nowadays you never know - and I live in Malaysia, a country in South-East Asia.
Our national language happens to be Malay, which is also used as the medium of instruction in schools. However, my family speaks English at home, so I've always considered English my first language. I think in English, read English, dream in English, and talk to myself in English!
This, er, propensity towards the English language sometimes gets me labelled a "banana" - a Chinese who is yellow on the outside, yet white inside. You see, while I am Malaysian Chinese, I don't speak any Chinese dialect fluently. My parents are from different dialect groups (my dad is Hockchiew/Foochow and my mom is Cantonese).
As far as Chinese dialects are concerned, I speak a bit of Mandarin, a little Hokkien, less Cantonese, and hardly any Hockchiew. So when people ask me which dialect group I'm from, I usually sheepishly say, "Well, I'm supposed to be Hockchiew [children take after the father]... but I don't speak it!" Oops... my poor ancestors!!!
I turn a quarter-century old on Aug 25 this year and haven't quite decided how I feel about it. Sure, I jokingly bemoan how old I'm getting, but secretly I'm pretty happy being 25. Not for anything would I want to be 18 again. I'm finally facing the fact that I'm an adult, and being an adult is anytime waaaaaaayy better than being a kid!
Professionally, I'm a writer. I've always loved writing (as this blog clearly shows!) and I thought it would simply be the ideal job for me. So despite graduating in 2000 with a degree in law, I really never intended to go into the legal profession.
"Then why on earth did you study law?!" I hear. To cut a long story short, I believed it was what God wanted me to do :)
As the eldest of two children, I can sometimes be caught referring to Blink, my brother, in my writings here. He's four years my junior and currently pursuing university degree in psychology. I used to think he was a pest, but now that he's grown up into a normal human being, we get along pretty OK, I have to admit.
My mom is a stay-at-home mom whom I'm guessing must be suffering from Empty Nest Syndrome since Blink left home, and my dad's a physician. Paying to consult a doctor is still an alien concept to me :P