Don’t you know,

I’m beautiful up close

But you only ever look at me from

Far

Away

I thought, for those of you are holed up at home because of COVID-19, I would compile a playlist for you. Hopefully, with this playlist you will discover some extremely underrated and unknown artists. Stay safe everyone and remember to always wash your hands for at least 20 seconds. Use hand sanitizer whenever you can and avoid going outside and congregating in large groups.

• Shadow-AB6IX
• Blvd-Adam Ragsdale
• Make You My Love-Adele
• The Bubble-Adrian Jorgensen
• Luha-Aegis
• Heaven-Ailee
• She Was Mine-AJ Rafael
• Moon-AKMU
• Let Me Down Slowly-Alec Benjamin
• Don’t Look Back-Amarante
• I Found-Amber Run
• I Just Fall In Love Again-Anne Murray
• I Can’t Carry This Anymore-Anson Seabra
• Bloom-Astro
• When the Wind Blows-Astro
• Butterfly-Astro
• Head Above Water-Avril Lavigne
• Answer-ATEEZ
• Brand New-Band Rector
• everything i wanted-Billie Eilish
• Not About Angels-Birdy
• We are Bulletproof:the Eternal-BTS
• You are the Reason-Calum Scott
• Hold On-Chord Overstreet
• Everglow-Coldplay
• Changing-Conrad Sewell
• Better Better-Day6
• Sing for you-EXO
• Break My Heart gain-FINNEAS
• Start of Time-Gabrielle Aplin
• Waking up Slow- Gabrielle Aplin
• I Don’t Like You- Grace VanderWaal
• Table of Fools-IBE
• Dear Me-IU
• Rules of Beautiful-Jacob Whitesides
• Scars-James Bay
• Break My Heart Right-James Bay
• Wasn’t Expecting That-Jamie Lawson
• Won’t Cry-Jay Chou
• Industry-Jon McLaughlin
• Hug Me-Jung Joonil
• I swear I’ll never leave again-Keshi
• Gone With the Wind-Roy Kim
• Fragile-Roy Wang
• Face to Face-WayV

How we perceive ourselves is based so much of on what people have told us…we can’t be considered beautiful if we are ugly . We can’t be accepted if we aren’t skinny. We can’t be accepted if we aren’t a certain race, religion, colour. All of these things revolve around our outwards appearance. They have always. So rarely do we take into account(however clique it is) personality-inwards appearance.

It’s unfair. It’s unfair for the people that are shunned because of your ideas. It’s unfair to the people who aren’t shunned. Your categorisation of people, it’s stifling. It causes all of us, including you(if you did not create these standards for your benefit)to conform to these standards, however much you have to change yourself, twist yourself. How many choices have you made without taking into account what others way think? If they will judge you? Kind of like words. When we change we keep all of us and add things on. But those are the lucky ones, not all of us keep the whole part of us. Others, when they change, they lose parts of themselves to add something on.

But these ideas, they’re so trivial. We all have the same feature in varying shapes and sizes, so what about their placement makes us look different? For all I know, the things that factor into our brain deciding what is beautiful are, measurements, symmetry, averaging and the affects of hormones. What if we were told that being fat was the ideal body shape? That being ugly was beautiful. What if we were told the opposite of what people tell us now?

What we think is beautiful, is all a string of our brain’s algorithms, calculations kind of how the coding off a computer brings you a document.

Bending to fit in these twigs, it’s impossible, we can’t even penetrate it without some sort of tool. And even so, it will snap because of its fragility. Caring about how others perceive you, it will break you. It will snap you. Be the word that you are, perhaps evolve into a different word with the same meaning as you grow, but never lose a part of yourself trying to fit into the twigs people throw at you.

As I felt that the other post was lacking, here is a playlist of some of my favourite Korean songs. Be warned, I have been told that my music taste is unique and I tend to go overboard with song recommendations. Also, if you do not like kpop, I will create playlists of other genres in later posts.

• So Far Away- Agust D (feat. Suran)
• How can I love the heartbreak, you’re the one I love-AKMU
• Innocent love-ASTRO
• Better with you-ASTRO
• Korean Dream-ASTRO
• Last Dance-BIGBANG
• If you-BIGBANG
• Stay-BLACKPINK
• To my youth-BOL4
• Beautiful Pain-BTOB
• Crystal Snow-BTS
• Let go-BTS
• Epiphany-BTS
• Magic Shop-BTS
• First Love-BTS
• Inner Child-BTS
• Love Words-Chen
• My dear-Chen
• Goodnight-Chen
• Beautiful-Crush
• Freely-DAY6
• Colors-DAY6
• Sing Me-DAY6
• I’m serious-DAY6
• I wait-DAY6
• I need somebody-DAY6
• I love you-DAY6
• I smile-DAY6
• Man in a movie-DAY6
• For life-EXO
• Sing for you-EXO
• You are my everything-Gummy
• The lonely bloom stands alone-HYNN
• Flower-IU
• Ending scene-IU
• Breathe-Lee Hi
• My Love-Lee Hi
• End of a Day-JONGHYUN
• The snowman-Jung Seung Hwan
• The Late Regret-KEN
• To you my light-Maktub
• Me after you-Paul Kim
• Everyday, Every moment-Paul Kim
• Wild Flower-Park Hye Shin
• All about you-TAEYEON
• Lean on me-10cm
• Only You-Yang Dail
• From the beginning until now-Ryu
• Beautiful Liar-VIXX LR
• Tell me what to do-SHINee
• Say Love-VIXX
• Navy & Shining Gold-VIXX
• Hero-MONSTA X

It’s inevitable, our reaction towards something or someone different. You don’t even know that it is happening, you don’t even question the hatred that rises within you, that travels through your veins to your heart. That hatred that drives you to taunt, to physically abuse, to discriminate those that are different. That hatred that refuses to let you admit its presence, that leaves you repeatedly denying your actions and their destructive effects. It drives you to inflict wounds both psychological and physical and then leaves you in oblivion.

This hatred of which you react with, you wield it without knowledge of the consequences, without knowledge beyond the oblivion. It is what drives you to discriminate so many of the Asian people that you associate yourself with, or that you shun.

Is it because of our yellow skin, our small eyes, our flat facial features? All those typical Asian stereotypes that you are told about? Think again.

You’re classifying us as a group of things that are made over and over again, like how machines make the same clothing an infinite amount of times. You don’t even think about us as anything but what your are told, and what you see. Not all of us have yellow skin, small eyes, flat faces etc. I once read that Marco Polo once described us as white, until people read what he said, and they saw us. Then they called us yellow.

It was because we didn’t look like them that they called shunned us, hated us.

When I was in primary school people shunned me for being Asian, it worsened in fifth to sixth grade. In class it was my classmates, my friends. They asked me why I had such a flat face. They theorised that I probably fell hard on my fave on my way down from heaven. I told them that they hurt me, they said it was just a joke.

In OOSH it was those younger children, who taunted me about my language, my face, my skin. I didn’t respond to what they said, so they stood up and pelted soccer balls and handballs at me. They thought it was funny, they didn’t care, the teacher didn’t care.

And the worse time. That was when my friend saw me being taunted, and she just walked backwards and watched.

As I said in my first post, the thing about discrimination is not recognising it. It’s not turning your back.

So this all not be classified in your mind as extreme bullying, but it hurt. Even though they said it was a joke. even though it was the younger people who didn’t understand. It hurt.

I hated being Asian. I hated it because of something that you said that you called a joke.

To know that people accept you for who you are, that’s great.

But to know that people love you for who you are, that’s even better.

— H.C.A Agate

People tell you to speak up when you are going through or have went through something awful, unbearable. They tell you that they will listen, but do they really?

All those times in my life I’ve tried to speak up to the people who say they will listen, my words fall to deaf ears, my traumatizing experiences are downplayed, and, instead of that relief that people say you will feel if you speak up, I feel so depressed.

I was discriminated throughout primary school as I was one of the few, very few, Chinese/ Asian people in my school. They shunned me because of my yellow skin, my small, eyes, my flat face; typical Asian stereotypes. When I told them that they had hurt me, they told me that it was a joke. Joke or not, I was ashamed to be Asian.

In preschool, I was sexually assaulted by a group of boys I thought were my friends. They touched me, they licked me and I cried out for help but no one heard. Ever since then, I was uncomfortable around boys and men. I couldn’t stand near them, couldn’t talk to them, couldn’t pay for my shopping if they were at the counter. I told my mum, she said that it should be easy to forget about as they were just young children too. She said that I shouldn’t be too sensitive.

And now, this obsession with weight, with being thin, with being pretty, it’s destroying me. I can’t go outside because I feared people were judging me. Every eye that looked up, that darted around, was judging me. I used to wear over sized and long hoodies, even when it was hot, to disguise my not so skinny legs.

All those times I tried to tell people how I felt they ignored me.

The thing about discrimination, racism, mental health is not recognizing it, it’s not turning your back.

Now on a different note, here is the content you will find on my blog:

• Quotes- some that I have made up and some I have found
• Playlists- Unknown and deep songs and other genres
• Poetry
• Articles about issues that I are important to me such as, racism to Asians and people conforming to fit in with societies standards
• Short stories or one-shots

Also, this is the first time I have created a blog so please don’t expect a lot from my writing.