The picture above shows a group of women, belonging to the women’s movement in Malaysia (then Malaya) called AWAS (Conscious Women’s Front). It was taken in an anticolonial demonstration against the British somewhere in 1946, a year after the movement was established as part of a women’s wing of the Malay Nationalist Party (PKMM). The signage that they were holding says API, AWAS, GERAM — Fire, Beware, Angry — the acronyms for their leftist parties of the time (Angkatan Pemuda Insaf, AWAS, Gerakan Angkatan Muda) whose among combined efforts was part of those who helped produce the people’s constitutionals, challenging the Malayan Union. What especially stays in my mind was the image of these women clad in baju kurung and kebaya — the traditional costume for women in the Malay peninsula, and as such, in Malaysia — an imagery of the juxtaposition of the idea of submissive Malay women against the notion of female emancipation which, during the time, was quite frowned upon.
But also maybe things don’t change much. It was also frustrating to find out that AWAS — as one of the largest radical women’s movements at that time — not only face external threats from the colonial powers, but also internally in a sense that they also faced societal pressure, where the idea that Malay women were often assigned to a secondary and private sphere, and if they could be active in the political sphere, their roles are only complementary — which was how AWAS started as a women’s wing of PKMM, until they started to demand their own agency. Because of this, and because the patriarchal tendencies still had a strong hold even among the most progressive male anti-colonialists, female activists still had to censor themselves and be more exposed to criticism whenever they were perceived as “overstepping the limits”. A lot of things still do not change, and as such, we have so much more work to do.
Someone wise said that she does not want to speak about work because the reward for good work is more work, and she doesn’t want that. Which, I wholly agree! But I have also been thinking about this paragraph from the book that I am reading now, A Virtue of Disobedience by Asim Qureshi on how, as a person, there is no separating yourself and your principles from the work that you do – and I think this is the notion that I want to subscribe to:
In the case of this work, my aim is to desecularise the notion of action from spirit. As a Muslim, who is conscious of Allāh, I want to place my social justice commitments within the circulatory system of my spirituality - I don’t want to ‘punch-out’ at the end of my activism day and ‘punch-in’ to the mosque for my spirit – for if there is no connection between the two then how can I still understand being a Muslim in a world that is full of injustice, particularly when millions of those I share a connection with are the subjects of that oppression?
On my birthday today, I have been thinking a lot — as I often do — in how I want to situate my principles and align with the work I am currently doing. As far as I have found out, user experience (UX) and user-centred design (UCD) has its shortcomings in a sense that they exclude the greater ecosystem of people and non-people that will be impacted by the products and processes we build, hence they continue to cause harms — and because of that, I want to be involved with people that aim to do better. I am an old(er) person with a newly found autoimmune disease (short story, but I don’t feel like talking about it now), I no longer have the tenacity to fight from within the system, so I understand the extent of my limitation. In addition, I had always failed to connect to the idea of agile methods and sprints, of constant running and hustling. And if you ever want to design for co-liberation, you need to build trust. Which is something that you cannot rush in 2-week cycles of sprints.
In a much much simpler term, I want to care more. And even if it would take a much longer time to get this right, so be it.
The week leading to my birthday, my mother caught a sore throat, and given the current *gestures to everything* we were basically freaking out. After consulting the doctor, he did not recommend for us to get swab tests, since her lungs were found to be clear and she had no other symptoms. She hadn’t left home in weeks, so if (touch wood) she caught the virus, it was through me who was tasked to be the one to go on buying groceries and running errands. The doctor however, suggested that we masked ourselves in our own home, and kept a distance from each other. We took it a step further and decided that I now live upstairs, and she, downstairs until 28th January (10 days of self-isolation). Which meant that, on my birthday, already physically isolated from my friends and family except through the comfort of the emotional prophylactic of a screen that is our video calls, I could not also celebrate my birthday (physically) today with practically the only person I am directly bound by blood, and live with. I understand that by saying this, I am also situating myself within my own privilege of being able to isolate in a home with enough space to contain us both within a safe distance.
I was never big on my own birthday, for it reminds me of my own mortality and whatnot. But today I woke up early and put on ‘real’ clothes — I chose my favouritest polka dot dress, as you can see below — and ordered myself a bouquet of sunflowers because, at the risk of sounding silly, that was what I would like to be in the eyes in my friends and my family hopefully, a ray of light. I used to joke a lot that I was not very big on flowers because they would die on you and they can be very expensive and I’d rather have a pizza, but I have always wanted a bouquet of sunflowers for some time, and I have some extra cash to splurge on, so I got them.
There is a Greek word hypomone, which means “patient endurance,” “the capacity to hold out or bear up in the face of difficulty, patience, endurance, fortitude, steadfastness, perseverance.” The associated verb, hypomeno, means “to stay in a place beyond an expected point of time, remain/stay (behind), while others go away”; “to maintain a belief or course of action in the face of opposition, stand one’s ground, hold out, endure, remain instead of fleeing.”
The year before and now is not promised to be trash (and not promised to be not trash either!) but as an overachiever conditioned by the illusion of merits and competitiveness this world had trained us to, I am trying to be comfortable with small and slower wins this year. Also because — not a flex, also kind of a flex — I just literally graduated from my doctorate, launched a very special project with my precious and smart pals (please check it out here!), and picked up a number of documentation jobs through recommendations of a very brilliant friend who had spent years in the space, found out I like it (and kind of good at it), and learned so much more on feminist-oriented ICT and data initiatives more than I could ever hope for. We have done a lot already. It’s the pandemic, if the most we can do is get up and write a sentence, it’s already a win for us.
I have no idea what the next few months are going to bring, but I hope I have the patient endurance, that this year is going to be the year of hypomone.
Here’s to turning 39. I wish for myself perpetual personal growth and curiosity, the strength to fight the good fight, and to be able to continually discern myself (with care) on ideas — especially those that challenge my previous assumptions — that I am yet to learn, with much humility and respect the humanity needs. If you are thinking of gifting me something, feel free to donate to any of the causes you feel strongly about on #kitajagakita. Oh, I also wish to hug my mother on 28th January, when our self-isolation ends.
May we always be radically imagining.
Image description: A girl smiling, in a brown hijab (that’s me!) and blue polka dot dress holding a bouquet of sunflowers. Behind her is a shelf of books, and a hanging black tapestry of the entire galaxy.
(This piece was written within just an hour, and as such, there are no extensive fact-checks done. I am not holding you to free labour, but if you ever find any factual discrepancies, or lack of sensitivities in my writing — which I admit to often accidentally overlook due to the oversight in my knowledge, experiences, and privileges — feel free to let me know.)
Reading in my tabs:
What tech can learn from sex workers, and 5 ways to make AI a greater force for good in 2021.
Nothing made sense during the pandemic — unless you are on the Internet.
"When rich economies take more than they need just to be safe, they deplete the global supply." A doctor is at the front of the vaccine line. His family in Zimbabwe is among the last in the world to receive it.
On the ethical quandaries of archiving videos and images of the storming of the US Capitol on January 6. The data now being archived could haunt people in the photos for years to come, even if they later renounce or pay criminal penalties for their actions. But also, where are all of this energy when facial recognition was used to identify BLM protesters, hm?
"This project is ironic because a map symbolises travel, discovery, and possibility, almost all of which Covid-19 has suppressed. Pragmatically, I don’t need a map when I’m not leaving my house. But in another sense, I feel like I need maps more than ever. I don’t know what comes next, or which metaphorical life-turn to take during this time of perpetual uncertainty." CityLab readers were asked to create their own maps that show what their worlds look like after coronavirus.
"I am not performing my totality on social media. No one is; no one should. What should we expect from people we follow? That they act like people, and we respond in kind." I self-censored myself a lot these days because every time I post on social media there will be some rando policing or explaining the most obvious things to me, and Alicia's post is something I agree with on some parts.
"Is your empathy muscle in tune with the new realities your customers and users are facing? How is your product or service adapting to these changes?" UX-ers, time to revisit personas with a post-pandemic lens.
I love these inventions: Hijack Your Feed where you could replace Twitter ads with your to-do list, Typefully where it gives you a high-fidelity live preview of your Twitter thread while you're typing it, and find movies by writing the synopsis.
TIL: exformation, where the speaker has deliberately thrown away a huge body of information, though it remains implied.
“Oh Ozymandiases of the world, do you really think yourselves kings of kings? How quickly you forget, nothing outlasts the fading of the day, but the light of truth itself?”
STATUS BOARD
Reading: Asim Qureshi's A Virtue of Disobedience, and Brit Bennett's The Vanishing Half.
Listening: This whole playlist of Ethiopian Tezeta music.
Watching: I have been spending my days working at my desk while having Window Swap in my second monitor. We haven't been able to travel these days, and to have very sweet simple invention where it allows you to look out from someone's window from anywhere in the world (I even 'took' a whole train trip in Colombia!) is like a balm to my soul. Also, more Slow TV channels.
Food & Drink: Ordered my favourite mee celop again!