This is a story of a Malaysian woman who thought she was gaining “international exposure,” only to realise two weeks in that she was living through a modern-day colonial rerun.
When I joined that company, I thought, wah, this is it. The kind of job you tell people about just to impress. “Oh yeah, I’ve worked with a global conglomerate.” The pay was good enough to make me say, okay lah, I can tahan the nonsense for a while. Maybe a year, maybe two as I just wanted the exposure, some stories, and bragging rights.
Fast forward… two weeks in, and I was questioning every life choice that brought me here.
The “Exposure” That Broke Me
You know how people always hype working with foreigners as some kind of enlightenment? “You’ll gain international experience!”
International experience, huh? More like international humiliation.
From day one, I could feel it. The way some of these ang moh bosses looked at us local staff i.e. not as colleagues, but as cheap labour with slightly better English skills than the cleaner.
I remember explaining a process clearly and politely with simple English, understandable, even professional and… getting that look. The one that screams, “Aiya, so cute, she’s trying so hard but clearly still a kid.”
I could literally feel the invisible thought bubble above their heads: “She just graduated from Uni Malaysia, bless her.”
And oh, the meetings. The endless, soul-sucking meetings. They’d sit there, arms crossed, saying stuff like:
“We need to optimise cross-functional synergy and leverage our core competencies.”
I had to Google half of these words on my phone just to survive the sentence. Meanwhile, they were paid hundreds of ringgit an hour to talk about things that, frankly, didn’t matter. Sometimes, I swear even they didn’t know what they were saying.
Confident, But Not Competent
Here’s the plot twist: some of them weren’t even good at their jobs.
One day, my boss suggested a “new workflow” that was literally the old workflow… with fancy PowerPoint slides and a few buzzwords thrown in.
“Let’s do this to enhance productivity.”
Translation: We’ll confuse the juniors, make them work harder, and I look like a genius.
When things went wrong? Suddenly it was my fault. My “poor English” apparently caused the execution gap. Somehow my accent became the scapegoat for their inefficiency.
And the absurdity didn’t end there. They’d casually throw ridiculous requests like:
“Can you stay back tonight and prepare the presentation? Oh, and make it look like we spent days on it.”
Paid five times more, doing half the work… and I’m the one running around printing, formatting, and begging the IT guy to make graphs work.
The Subtle Microaggressions
Oh, and let’s not forget the microaggressions. Those little jabs that make you question your existence.
- Asking if my English “could be clearer” when my reports were flawless.
- Commenting on how “Malaysia does things differently” in a way that implies “wrongly.”
- Repeatedly telling me to “just follow instructions” even when I had better solutions.
It made me feel like I was in a colonial drama: except it wasn’t 1800, it was 2025, and I was stuck in the office.
Who’s Really Talented?
After a few weeks, I realized something: Malaysia has amazing local talent. Smart, hardworking, capable people, yet somehow, we’re still handing top jobs to foreigners because they speak with a posh accent.
It’s frustrating. Infuriating even. How are we supposed to move forward as a country if we undervalue our own people while glorifying outsiders who don’t always know what they’re doing?
The Takeaway
By the end of my short stint, I’d learned a lot: about corporate politics, cultural ego trips, and most importantly – my own worth.
So now, when someone says:
“Wow, you worked with ang mohs before? How was it?”
I just smile and say:
“Yeah, once. Never again.”
Some experiences look good on your CV, but feel awful in real life. And honestly? That was one of them.
Read more Malaysian office dramas, underpaid rants and overcaffeinated survival stories at In Real Life
Write in. Tell your story. Get paid.
Share your story on our Facebook page and you may become a contributor for In Real Life Malaysia.
I Made Sure My Ex-husband Lost Everything After He Cheated On Me With A 21 Year Old Influencer
More from Workplace
“My Boss Wanted Her RM1K Back After I Resigned,” Shares M’sian Worker
This is a story of a Malaysian guy who believed hard work and gratitude were enough until he discovered that …
“I Lied To Survive,” shares Honest M’sian man who Built Career on Fake Degree
This story is about a university dropout who faked his graduation date to land a job — and accidentally built …
“He fired me, then rehired me,” shares M’sian Tech who earned RM20K from ex-boss overnight
This story is about a M'sian tech who got fired after pulling an all-nighter — but ended up getting paid …
