A different story
We like to think of Aotearoa as a country that welcomes difference, but what is it like to grow up here when you don’t fit the Pa¯keha¯/Ma¯ori mould? Siobhan Downes talks to four New Zealand women about their experiences.
‘‘It’s really hard to think back because you block a lot of it out… it would be comments like, ‘Go back to your own country.’ ’’
Growing up in North Otago, fashion designer Sharon Ng didn’t feel like she fit in.
Her family owned a market garden in To¯ tara, a small community south of Oamaru, home to about a dozen other Chinese families.
Although she was a third generation Chinese New Zealand – her greatgrandfather came to New Zealand in the
1890s – at school, she was made to feel like an outsider.
‘‘It’s really hard to think back because you block a lot of it out… it would be comments like, ‘Go back to your own country.’ ’’
It wasn’t until she moved to Wellington in
1979 to attend fashion school that she started to look at her heritage in a positive light.
‘‘I was quite proud to be different.’’
Ng, who started her own label in the mid1980s and is the owner of the NG Boutique in Christchurch, says her love of clothing started at an early age.
‘‘My mother had friends who would send us boxes of Chinese garments – all our party dresses would come from Hong Kong. I remember it was always exciting opening up these paper-wrapped cartons.’’
She was also inspired by her mother’s wardrobe.
‘‘She had two pieces my grandmother had made for her – hand-stitched because she didn’t have a machine. They were beautiful silk – a cheongsam dress, and a pair of trousers,’’ Ng recalls.
‘‘Then she had all these special occasion garments that were tailored for her in Hong Kong. I ended up taking them with me to fashion school. They were appreciated because they were such good quality.’’
After graduating, Ng decided to spend some time in Hong Kong as part of her OE – ‘‘just to see what it was like to blend in’’.
To her surprise, she felt like a complete foreigner, with people over there mistaking her for being Japanese.
She returned to the South Island after just six months, with no doubt about where home was.
‘‘I just missed blue sky. I was definitely a New Zealander.’’