Suyin Haynes: “Mixed people aren’t so easily divisible, we’re the whole of our beings”
The editor on considered approaches, markers of her Malaysian heritage and learning as a lifelong journey
Hi, welcome back to Mixed Messages! This week I’m speaking to Head of Editorial at gal-dem, Suyin Haynes, who is of mixed Malaysian Chinese and white British heritage. As a journalist, I find Suyin’s work vital, dedicated to amplifying marginalised voices and giving people of colour a platform to speak on their own terms. That passion has undoubtedly been influenced by her mixed heritage, but I was excited to learn more about Suyin’s Malaysian background and her personal journey with mixedness. Dive in below.
What’s your family background?
My mum is Malaysian Chinese, and my father is white British. They met in a nightclub in Hammersmith after my mum moved here in the ‘70s. She came on a training scheme for NHS nurses, who were recruited from across Malaysia.
My grandfather was from near Guangzhou in mainland China. He moved to Malaysia, in the ‘50s as an entrepreneur and met my grandmother. She was adopted so we’re uncertain of her heritage, but definitely very old Cantonese heritage.
My brother was born in 1979, and he passed away in 2000. There was a fifteen year age gap between us. I always think that being mixed is such a unique experience and that everyone’s story is so different, but I wonder what he would have thought about where we’re at now.
Has your sense of self been quite consistent over time and place?
I grew up in Bromley in South London and the school I went to was fairly diverse. We were fortunate enough to go back to Malaysia at least once a year when my grandparents were alive. For so long, I thought that was normal. Other kids were going to Spain, I was going to Penang. We’d get up early in the morning and have goreng pisang, which is like banana pancakes, then I have memories of my grandmother getting ready to go to her Mahjong game, talcum powder on her face. I looked very visibly Asian when I was younger. As I got older, more people would look at me, questioning “who is that?”
In 2017, the opportunity came up to live in Hong Kong while I was working for Time. I was there until 2019 and during that time I was thinking a lot about the privilege I had of being somebody who had never been before, but who felt great to be somewhere where people are speaking Cantonese. I made an effort to learn Cantonese, integrate and do things that felt a bit more connected to the city. There is so much white privilege, there’s the thing of who’s classed as an expat and who’s an immigrant… I’ve always been conscious of having a real privilege to be in Asia, so I made the effort and had the humility to learn and understand where I was living, not just treating it like a playground.
Since I came back in 2019, my sense of self in terms of being mixed has come much more into the foreground. The pandemic saw a rise in anti-Asian hate, and seeing within the workplace how those events were treated, how Black Lives Matter was responded to and reported on in mainstream news, I found that triggering a lot of emotions in me that I hadn’t thought about in-depth before or reckoned with.
My sense of self is continuously evolving. The idea that for diaspora or second-generation people of not belonging in one place but being too much for the other feels so cliche to say, but it’s true. I’m very conscious of the way I’m racialised and the privilege that affords me, how comparatively other people have had much more direct experiences of racism.
Language is another sticky issue – has the way you speak about mixedness changed?
Language is so interesting and so imperfect. It’s been a journey for me. I don’t really think I described myself as ‘mixed-race,’ even though it’s longer I’d say “my mum’s Malaysian Chinese, my dad’s white British.”
I’ve moved away from using ‘white passing’ for myself because of the way it’s tied up with race as a social construct. I say “I am racialised as…” because that’s other people’s projections of me. There’s ‘mixed,’ but it means so many different things and there’s not as much representation of people that are mixed with two different heritages where neither of them are white. It’s going to take a while to get to all of that.
As a journalist, you’ve always prioritised telling stories of marginalised groups through your work. How else does your mixed heritage impact your career?
It’s hard to pinpoint what qualities I can attribute to my mixedness and what’s intrinsic to my character. The curiosity, the need for heterogeneity, multiplicity and a symphony of voices is vital. I try to be considered and thoughtful in my approach.
Growing up, I learned the sense of East Asian stoicism from my mum. Resilience, as well. Both my parents have resilience – my mum faced a lot of racism in the ‘70s, and then some of my dad’s family initially weren’t that accepting of her. My grandad was horrified that my mum was going to settle down with my dad too, so there’s that prejudice there. I think of the resilience to get through those things and try to be guided by empathy and passion. I don’t know whether that’s being mixed or a product of my environment – maybe it’s a combination.
How do you connect to your cultural background?
Family history, stories and legends. When I was in Malaysia, my mum and uncles would get together and shoot the shit. Food, definitely. It’s what sustains and nourishes us. When I was growing up, it was noodles or rice for breakfast. Coming back to school, people thought that was weird. When I had birthday parties at my house, it was always stir-fry noodles and the girls would go mad for it because they’d never had it before.
Another continuous thing is jewellery. I have this twisted gold bracelet that my maternal grandfather gave to my mum when she moved to the UK and then she gave it to me when I was moving to Hong Kong. I’ve also got a little jade pendant that was my grandmother’s. Having a tangible thing to touch is so meaningful, to know it’s been passed down and witness history.
What’s the best thing about being mixed for you?
Access to two completely different worlds and having a childhood where my horizons were expanded. Being fortunate enough to have those trips to Malaysia. I’m grateful for having access to those intangible moments and markers of culture and heritage – you can’t really describe why this bracelet or jade pendant is so special, it just is.
I’m grateful for having access to so many experiences. Learning, absorbing and interrogating is a lifelong journey. Having curiosity and the humility to know that I don’t know everything, that I’m always going to be taught new things.
I also never assume, and I think that comes from my own understanding of racial identity and the assumptions that have been placed onto me. I am cognisant of that when I meet new people and I wonder what I can learn, in an empathetic way.
Can you sum up your mixed identity in a word?
Tuta. While I was at Time, Tuta was the name of a group I was in of mixed colleagues. It means ‘whole’ in Esperanto. We’re so used to saying “half-this, half-that,” the last time someone said that to me I said “which half, my top or my bottom?” It’s a bad joke, but we’re actually whole. We’re not so easily divisible, we’re the whole of ourselves, our beings and identities which have layers and are so distinct.
Visit gal-dem.com for more of Suyin’s work. Next week, I’ll be speaking to wine writer Aleesha Hansel. Subscribe to get Mixed Messages in your inbox on Monday.
Enjoy Mixed Messages? Support me on Ko-Fi! Your donations, which can start from £3, help me pay for the transcription software needed to keep this newsletter weekly, as well as special treats for subscribers. I also earn a small amount of commission (at no extra cost to you) on any purchases made through my Bookshop.org affiliate links.
Mixed Messages is a weekly exploration of the mixed-race experience, from me, Isabella Silvers. My mom is Punjabi (by way of East Africa) and my dad is white British, but finding my place between these two cultures hasn’t always been easy. That’s why I started Mixed Messages, where each week I’ll speak to a prominent mixed voice to delve into what it really feels like to be mixed.
great post - I think the nugget here is that both sets of parents were upset at a mixed-race marriage, yet somehow, a beautiful woman emerged from the union. thinking of humans as whole beings rather than a hierarchy of intersectional qualities forcing one to prioritize one's family heritage into a checklist of grievances is a novel thought. Hmmm. . So refreshing to read this