Story: Malaysians and Singaporeans

University of Otago students Mimi Abdul (left), Lili Mat and Jamaiah Sharif serve Malaysian food during an international food festival in 1998. Malaysians have come to New Zealand to study since the 1950s, either as private students or on Colombo Plan scholarships. In the 1950s they would have struggled to find traditional cooking ingredients, but today there are Asian speciality shops in all the main centres.