My name is Marsha Damita Siagian. As you might have noticed, I will refer myself as aChar, and I was born on 2 June 1984, somewhere in hot-and-humid (and stuffy) Jakarta. To ease identification, there is a photo of me included somewhere on this site. I have an elder sister, and live in Camberwell with my cousins. My parents live in Indonesia and they occasionally come to visit and have a check on us.
Born of parents of Indonesian origin, I automatically become an Indonesian. My father came from a village around Lake Toba, Sumatra; my mother came from Manado in Celebes. It's hard to exactly classify my ethnic background (e.g. half Batakese, a quarter Manadonese, an eight each of Chinese and Dutch with some minuscule fractions of Jewish and Moor.) Sometimes people still fuss about it, but I'm pretty happy to call myself a BatMan: Batakese-Manadonese.
The first two years of my education starts in a kindergarten close to my home in Sunter, Jakarta. The next eight and a half years were spent in St. Ursula, of which two and a half years was spent in its famous girls-only high school. I was a pure rebel back then, getting detention on every other day. Then my parents sent me to Melbourne (at last), made me gladly enjoyed a clean start in Year 10. Back then I went to Camberwell Anglican Girls' Grammar School and received a privilege to take care of its badminton and Social Service activities in 2001. I was accepted in the University of Melbourne (to do the Commerce/IS undergraduate course) in January 2002. At last, I am a normal girl.
If you ask me this question, I honestly don't know what to say. It just came to me on the final VTAC submission day - my mum came along and suggested why not give Commerce/IS a shot, so I did so without giving it a second thought (if you are in Year 12, don't do this.) I enjoy doing Commerce, but I haven't managed to fare well in IS. Two Ps so far... so I'm expecting a change this semester! :q
Last updated: 30 September 2002
