#Hear from Her: An ethnic minority single mother

#聽她的話: 一位少數族裔單親媽媽

Photo credit: Joantan Beacerra from Unsplash

Embracing Motherhood is the theme for Hong Kong Momtrepreneurs in 2020. The beneficiaries of MOMs4MOMs Fellowship Program are interviewed to share the stories of #EmbracingMotherhood.

One of the EM beneficiaries, Ar See had share her stories and thoughts of #Embracing Motherhood:

《母限》是香港創業媽媽2020年的主題,訪問了Moms4Moms媽媽企業家培訓計劃的獲益者並分享了關於《母限》的故事。

其中一位少數族裔的獲益者-阿思,分享了她的故事和對《母限》的想法。

阿思是香港土生土長的巴基斯坦裔女性。由於她少時不愛讀書,她小學便輟學,而她的父母早早就為她安排婚姻。不過,她的婚姻並不美滿,育有兩兒的她常常遭受丈夫家暴。為逃離家暴,阿思23歲時決定離婚。不幸的是,她年少離婚後長年受社群排擠,「啲女仔朋友怕我搶佢地老公,就唔再搵我。的確佢地有啲老公古古怪怪,成日響太太背後打俾我。」

被社群排擠又不識字,單親媽媽阿思多年來把孩子帶大實在十分艱苦。不過,好學、愛笑的她還是十分積極,不時做義工和學習手工藝、美容等技能。現時兒子也終於能夠自立,不過她心中還是有一點遺憾,就是她上過的手工藝和美容進修班往往都要通過筆試才能得到證書,因此不懂得讀寫中、英文的她上完課程後總是無法考到資格,進而無法進入她真正心儀的美容行業。

「好多南亞裔女性都同我一樣不識睇同寫中文同英文,好多時通過唔到啲進修班,希望出面嘅課程都可以理解下我哋唔識睇中文,搵方法俾我哋去學習同參與。好多南亞裔女性係想出去做嘢,不過受中文讀寫限制咋。」阿思用流利的廣東語說,為她的社群發聲。

了解更多有關Moms4Moms媽媽創業家培訓計劃,資助一位母親免費學習:www.hkmomtrepreneurs.com/moms4moms

以上由Rolling Books「滾動對話」的同事進行訪談和撰寫。圖片並不是阿思她本人。

Photo credit: qinghill from Unsplash

Ar See is a Pakistani woman who was born and raised in Hong Kong. As she didn’t like to study when she was young, she dropped out of primary school and her parents arranged marriage for her. However, her marriage was not happy. As a mother of two children, she often suffered domestic violence from her husband. In order to get out of this abusive relationship, Ar See decided to divorce when she was 23 years old. Unfortunately, she was ostracized by the community for many years after her divorce. “Those girlfriends were afraid that I would grab their husbands, so they didn’t find me again. Indeed, some weird husbands called me behind their wives’ backs.”

Being frozen out by the community and illiterate, this single mother has struggled to bring up her children for many years. However, Ar See is proactive, she always beams with smiles, and eager to learn. She is active in volunteering and learning handicrafts, beauty, and other skills from time to time. Now, her son is finally being independent. However, she still has little regret for the handicraft and beauty training courses’ certificate. As she has to pass a written test for those courses attended to get a certificate, she is always unable to pass the qualifications after finishing the courses just because she doesn’t know how to read and write Chinese and English. That’s why she is unable to enter the beauty industry that she loves.

“A lot of South Asian women are similar to me, they don’t know how to read and write Chinese and English. Many of them fail in the advanced courses. I hope that those courses can understand our difficulties, so we can also learn and participate in the same. Many South Asian women want to go out and work, but they are just restricted by the ability of Chinese reading and writing.” Ar See speaks in fluent Cantonese, speaks for her community.

The above was interviewed and written by colleagues from Rolling Books. The picture is not Ar See herself.

To learn more about Moms4Moms Fellowship Program and support a mother to learn for free: http://www.hkmomtrepreneurs.com/moms4moms

%d bloggers like this: