Making the rounds among Singapore’s netizens is a short film depicting a Taiwanese story, in which a ten-year-old girl from Kaohsiung, Taiwan won a prize for an artwork entitled “Mother” but shocked the audience at the award ceremony by admitting that “She’s not my mother”.
The video began trending in Singapore after Prime Minister Lee Hsien Loong’s wife, Ho Ching, shared a post about the video on her Facebook page. Her post received hundreds of shares and reactions on social media.
The video begins with a girl, named Yang Yah Ting, in a wheelchair painting a picture, accompanied by an adult male. The man accompanies the girl as she appears at an award ceremony, holding a picture of a woman presumed to be her mother.
Yah Ting receives the first prize for her artwork entitled “Mother” that she had submitted to a national art competition. She, however, tells the stunned audience that the woman in the painting is not her mother.
A flashback sequence ensues and viewers see Yah Ting in the custody of child services as a baby. Viewers learn that Yah Ting’s biological parents were drug addicts who were sentenced to jail and that Yah Ting had been abused as an infant, causing her to sustain brain damage.
Yah Ting was then entrusted to a kind woman who took exceptional care of her and showered her with love. Even though Yah Ting frequently fell sick, she was cared for by her adoptive mother, who even went against her husband’s wishes to care for the child, all the while juggling other commitments such as fund-raising for other needy children.
The talented Yah Ting turns three and thrives in her adoptive mother’s care but tragedy strikes once again when the pair are caught in an earthquake. The flashback ends abruptly and viewers return to the awards ceremony.
Yah Ting repeats, “She’s not my mother.” She then adds, poignantly: “She’s greater than my mother.”
Viewers then learn that Yah Ting’s adoptive mother had been crushed under the earthquake debris but had urged Yah Ting not to be afraid even as she herself suffered. Viewers then finally get to see the artwork Yah Ting won the prize for — a picture of a mother protecting a baby as she carries a mountain on her back.
Watch the video in full here: