Throughout my childhood, my parents emphasized on the importance of exercise as a way to lose way and to keep healthy. My brothers and I were enrolled in swimming classes. On top of swimming classes, our parents wanted us to play a sport. My older brother chose ice hockey. My younger brother and I followed suit, joining an ice hockey camp with one of my cousins. I did not enjoy ice hockey as it hurt my back due to always having to bending over in order for the hockey stick to be on the ground. My parents would then let me try a variety of sports whereas my brothers and cousin would go on to continue with ice hockey. I tried my hand at skating lessons which I enjoyed, but when I advanced to the higher levels, the classes began to be comprised of only girls and figure skating started to become introduced. I decided to stop taking skating lessons as I didn’t like being the only boy in the class and I was scared of performing ‘feminine’ movements, being labelled as ‘gay’ as a result.

I did not know what sport I wanted to do next, so my parents signed me up for Tae Kwon Do, which I did not like at all. I hated the discipline and sparring with other people. I stopped after a year when I received an orange belt. I would then be signed up for Kung-Fu, which was run by one of my father’s patients. Surprisingly, I did not enjoy it either. It was once again too rigid and strict for me. I also tried golf, which was too static and boring for me. I attempted basketball, which I absolutely hated as I was horrible at dribbling though my free throws were quite good. I was signed up for soccer, which I also hated as I was horrible with dribbling and feared that I would break my legs if I tried to get the ball from another person.

Eventually, I joined Citi Swim, which was a swimming program that acted as an introduction to competitive swimming. I learned to swim faster and how to improve my strokes, while getting a lot of exercise as I swam for an hour three times a week, every Monday, Wednesday and Friday. I genuinely enjoyed swimming. I enjoyed the competition with team members and being able to challenge my personal best times. I liked not having others depend on me for the team’s success. I swam for myself and I was pretty good. The Citi Swim programs that I was a part of were mostly comprised of girls with a few guys. Out of all the guys, I would usually be the fastest, which made me feel good. Sometimes, I went to swim meets where I did quite well. Whereas my brothers had hockey trophies and medals, I had loads of swim ribbons. Eventually, I got too old for Citi Swim, whose maximum age was 16, and took up tennis instead.

I was good at tennis. I took lessons at a nearby tennis court and Mother would sign me up for private tennis lessons where I excelled. However, I was constantly criticized for being too lazy to run. And you had to run in tennis, in order to be able to reach the tennis ball in time to hit it. As a family, we played tennis every weekend at a nearby court as a family activity. My younger brother was naturally quite adept at sports and he would excel at tennis without lessons, which I found annoying. Although his tennis strokes were consistently poor, he would always be able to hit the tennis ball over the net and score a point, especially whenever he performed a volley or a slice as I was too lazy to run.

As I wasn’t as busy as my brothers were due to not playing ice hockey, I was enrolled in the life-saving swim levels when I reached them. My parents told me that I could get a job as a lifeguard in the summer when I didn’t have school. I hated the lifeguard courses as I did not want to be responsible for someone dying on my watch. I did eventually pass the lifeguard course on my second try when I was in high school though. However, I never actually worked as a lifeguard as I had to spend my summers studying for the SAT, a standardized test for college admission in the United States, which I had to take it a few times to improve my score for easier university acceptance.