This year, the new iPhone 7 is coming out.

There will be a new President for

America come the general election. We will turn the calendar page from December
2015 to January 2016. There are a lot of changes going on in the world. Whether they
are for the better or for the worse remains to be seen.
To me, airports do not bring a sense of farewell. Instead, they instil in me a
sense of hope, of new beginnings and the thrill of the unknown. Because to go to an
airport means your life is changing. To board that plane, to hand the air steward your
boarding pass, to touch down in somewhere totally unfamiliar to you is the point
where your life takes a path not yet charted or confined by the obligations of your life
back home. Why am I spouting so much about airports? I hope to be at one by next
year, thats why. Im 17 this year and in my country, this means having to take the
SPM or O-Levels. And the results of this potentially life-altering examination could
either have me on an airplane to somewhere new and exciting or land me in a local
college. I dont mean to imply that local colleges in Malaysia are bad. Far from it,
actually. Its just that I have been dreaming of going to the UK ever since I was six.
My family isnt very rich and with my sick grandmother to take care of, funds arent
generally sufficient to send me abroad. Plus, theres also my younger sister. If we used
every cent to fly me to the UK, where would she be? Basically, what Id really like to
achieve this year, is to get 9A+ for my SPM, the best results one can get.
Another thing I want to achieve is to help bring about social equality for
women. If there is anything Ive seen of the world in my 17 years on Earth, it is that it
is capable of change. Why is it that society finds it easy to accept a phone that
responds to your fingers tapping on its screen but shuns women having equal rights?
Because it doesnt affect them, thats why. A phone that is sensitive to touch is
something wholly new and considered a technological miracle but women having
equal rights? Thats none of our business. Besides, our ancestors laid down the rules,
not us. Why should we bother, right? Wrong. I see women toiling every day to feed
their families and yet, at the end of the day, they receive less pay than their male
counterparts who did the exact same work. Did you know that African-American
women earn 64 cents and Latina women 56 cents for every dollar earned by a
Caucasian man? Women inequality and racial bias. Nice. Even more worryingly, a
WHO (World Health Organisation) article has revealed that 1 out of 3 women
worldwide have experienced either intimate partner violence or non-partner sexual
violence in their lifetime. It could be your daughter or your sister. Would you take that
risk? You see, people get nervous when I say Im a feminist. To them, being a feminist
is synonymous with hating men and thinking women are the superior race. But being a
feminist does not mean that. It means wanting equal rights for all, to be willing to
fight for the equality that womankind deserve. I am a feminist because if a man is in a
room full of women, he is ecstatic. But if a woman is in a room full of men, she is

terrified. I believe that as a society, we need to continue to encourage people to break

stereotypes and recognise the contributions each one of us, be it male or female can
make to the workplace or even to our countries.
I dont know if you know this but there is an unconscious bias against Asians in
most pre-dominantly white countries. Even in movies or TV shows, Asians are usually
portrayed as the bookish nerd who gets straight As and has really small eyes. News
flash: not all Asians are like that. Not all of us can speak Mandarin. Not all of us have
tiny beady eyes. And yes, most of us can speak English. I find it really infuriating
when in movies, the white characters go Ching chang chong or whatever when they
are trying to imitate Mandarin. Those words do not even exist in the Chinese
language! Also, just because you dont understand a language, that doesnt mean it
gives you the right to make fun of it. I mean, how would you like it if we Asians say
our ABCs in an exaggerated fashion to imitate English? So, what I want to do is make
people see that Asians are not something to make fun of. We are humans. We have
feelings too. Open your large blue eyes and take in the world around you. The world
doesnt just consist of one race. Recently, a survey sponsored by the Committee of
100 in the US revealed that 1 in 4 Americans has an Asian-American bias. And thats
not all. People who look Middle Eastern are regarded with deep suspicion because it
is a common misconception they are all suicide bombers or are members of ISIS.
Ironically, these white people who are racist see the world in black and white but what
really matters to them in terms of skin colour is not black and white but rather just
white.
Another thing I want to achieve in my lifetime is for the people of the world to
accept the LBGTQ community. For the most part, I think the world has taken baby
steps to accepting the love between two individuals regardless of gender. But for the
homophobic people in this world, that acceptance is a long way off. This is something
that will always baffle me. How can they look at gay couples and think that its
unnatural? How can anyone look at the face of love and say Oh yes, thats
disgusting? I believe we should be allowed to love who we want to. If we let our
children watch a movie in which a mermaid princess trades her tail, the very essence
of her magic to meet a human prince whom she has never spoken to but all will work
out in the end because true love conquers all, how is letting them believe two men or
two women can fall in love any less outrageous?