“There is a time for everything, and a season for every activity under the heavens:” – Ecclesiastes 3:1
This series of posts is written as dad lay critically ill in hospital with 4th stage lung cancer that has spread to different parts of the body (Update: Dad passed on just as I published this post around 155pm on 12 January 2024). He had lived a good, long and relatively healthy life. At 90, he would still walk the neighbourhood on his own, albeit weaker since recovering from prostate cancer 5 years ago. His mind was still sharp and alert even in hospital, dulled only recently because of the heavy dose of morphine to mask the pain.
The cancer came suddenly. He felt pain in the chest and hands and some general weakness in early November 2023. We thought it was just part of aging. Then in late November, the pain became unbearable and he had breathing difficulties. We rushed him to A&E where they found the left lung totally filled with fluid and started draining it. Four days later after most of the fluid had been drained, a CT scan confirmed large tumours deep in the left lung. A few scans of other parts of the body showed that it had spread to the brain and liver, and perhaps more as other parts were not scanned. Only palliative treatment was feasible given his age.
Dad was born on 7 April 1933 in Gopeng, Malaysia. He had lived a full life – he lived through the war as a young teen who had to look after young siblings, had a chinese-education at a time when socialist ideas were rampant in Malaysia, came to Singapore to work as a young adult, married, had four kids, a handful of grandkids and a great-grandson and other adventures. He had told us some stories occasionally over the years. I took the chance to talk to him further when he was still sharp in the mind and lying in hospital.
There is a season for every activity under the sun. When you have lived 90 years, surely there were many activities. These posts aim to document these to celebrate his life.
Early Years
Dad was the second in a large Cantonese-speaking family with 11 siblings, and the oldest son. My grandpa (dad’s father) had come from Kaiping （开平）, Guangdong province to Malaysia with great-grandpa when grandpa was still a child. It was part of a wave of immigrants from southern China at a time when China was experiencing famine, war and all sorts of hardship. Grandpa later went back to China to marry grandma who was betrothed to him. I was told guys in their village would marry girls specifically from another nearby village, almost always by arranged marriage. I recall being told that grandma was like between 16 to 18 when she got married and came to Malaysia. Not long later, she had her eldest daughter, and a year or so after that, my dad.
Great grandpa started a goldsmith shop. Grandpa tried various work besides helping at the shop. I was told he once sold fish. Unsold fish, probably the worst ones, were eaten by the family. Somehow dad learnt to cook, extremely well. Being the eldest son, he had to do household chores which include cooking. You have to cook well to mask the taste of bad fish! Grandpa (or perhaps it should be great-grandpa) eventually settled on setting up a goldsmith shop though I am not sure when. Probably it was after WW2.
Dad was not yet 9 when Japan invaded Malaya (the predecessor of Malaysia) in December 1941. My grandparents already had 2 sons and 5 daughters by then (though 3rd aunt died as a baby). The entire family ran into the jungle but soon came out when Malaya surrendered. As the eldest son, he had to take care of the youngest siblings in the jungle – 5th aunt was still an infant at that time. During the Japanese occupation, they returned to school but dad said the teachers were not teaching seriously. They had to be taught Japanese. Whatever the teachers could learn of the language themselves, they then taught the students. No one treated school seriously. Dad once told his grandkids that once, Japanese soldiers came to his house looking randomly for Chinese men who could be of threat. My grandpa hid behind the toilet door. Grandma pretended to be doing things in front of the toilet, blocking the door. When the soldiers asked who was inside, grandma and dad told them that there was no one and they left.
After the Japanese surrender in 1945, students returned to their normal school. He completed primary school in Gopeng and went to Yuk Choy for high school in nearby Ipoh. Most were overaged, including dad. Dad was excellent in sports. He represented his school in many sports. He was the interschools champion in long jump and triple jump and held the record at around 21 feet and 41 feet for both (current world record is 29 feet and 49 feet). He also did the sprint at a bit over 11 seconds.
When dad was in high school, there was a movement for students to go back to China. That was in the 1950s when the communist party took control of China and there were strong nationalist sentiments. Some of dad’s classmates planned to move to China, some against their parents’ wishes. Grandpa heard about it and locked dad at home until those who had wanted to leave had left. But I doubt dad actually intended to defy his father and go China because he is the type that avoids risks. Grandpa probably wanted to be very sure of it.
By that time, the goldsmith shop was doing well with the tin mine boom in Perak – my aunt told me the boom started around 1952. Dad said that he helped to sell in the shop and picked up some Tamil words because Indians were regular buyers of gold. He even picked up some skills in making gold necklaces and piercing ears for ear rings. With the shop and economic boom, life became better.
Dad finished high school in 1955 at 22 because of delays due to the war, and taught for around 3 years at his alma mater primary school in Gopeng, where grandpa was a board member of the school (grandpa was already doing better financially then with the goldsmith shop). Dad ended up in the same class as 2nd uncle (2 years younger than him) due to the war. After their high school, both wanted to register for a course to learn English. When registering, the office told them to go away because the school would not accept them. Uncle got up to leave, but dad pulled him back. Dad told uncle to stay and persist because he must make them agree. They spoke earnestly again with the office and were admitted.
Dad said he wanted to go Singapore to study at Nantah (Nanyang University) but grandpa objected, saying that it was not recognised by the government. So he applied to the Teachers Training College (TTC, now known as NIE) in Singapore. He was accepted, so he resigned from his teaching position to go Singapore. Dad led the way for his brother and later 5th sister to come Singapore. He was the first in their family to seek his fortune here.
[Additional post after wake: Dad the Playful Yet Loving Big Brother: At the funeral wake, my aunts and uncle told us more stories of dad as a big brother. My impression of dad has always been one who is strict and non-nonsense. I never realised that he had a playful streak in him, often teasing the younger siblings. Sometimes they would chase him when angry with the teasing, but they could not catch dad who was naturally athletic. Like all youngsters, he got into fights with his elder sister too. I finally realised that my naughtiness and playfulness might have come from dad! But they all told us of how dad looked after them well as a big brother, leading the way in many things. When he started working and returned home each holiday to Gopeng, he would bring them things that they liked. When dad later got married and had a house, at various times, his younger siblings stayed in Singapore at our house when they came here exploring their future. 2nd uncle and his wife moved to live with dad when they were newly married, until they bought their own place. I recall youngest uncle, 5th and 8th aunt also staying for quite an extended period in our house when I was in primary school. Often when whole families came for short holidays, our living room would be filled with mattresses for them to sleep on.)
The Hard Road to be a Teacher in Singapore
Dad had a rough time in Singapore. When he came in 1958, TTC wanted to rescind the letter of offer because he needed to be attached to a school in Singapore. His application was mistakenly accepted because TTC thought that the school he was teaching in was in Singapore. Dad was anxious. He had resigned from his position to seek his fortune in Singapore. He told grandpa. Grandpa had a fellow board member of the primary school, also from Gopeng who happened to be travelling via Singapore to Australia to see to his daughter’s further study. With grandpa’s introduction, dad met this gentleman to get him to refer him to the then-Minister for Education, Chew Swee Kee, who was also from Gopeng. The gentleman wrote a letter for dad. Dad took the letter and camped outside the Minister’s office until he got an audience. I was later told by an aunt that dad had worn out the soles of his shoes looking for the Minister – he must have made several trips there to find him. The Minister listened to his story and asked dad to choose from one of two schools. Dad chose Ama Keng Primary because it had accommodation for staff and he wanted to save money on rental. The Minister wrote on the back of the recommendation letter and dad went off with the letter to the school and became a temporary teacher at Ama Keng.
Unfortunately, the position was only for three months and the school had no vacancy after that. Dad was without a school and in danger of being kicked out of TTC again. Dad went to Minister Chew once more. The kind Minister referred him to Wen Xuan primary, a now=defunct smallish school in shop units along Neil Road and was hired. His place in TTC was saved again, thanks to the Minister and to dad’s tenacity.
Finding His Soulmate at TTC
At the first lesson as a trainee in TTC, the lecturer was walking around the class and saw my dad’s notes. Dad had fantastic handwriting (I never inherited this gene) and was meticulous in taking notes. The lecturer took up his notes and praised him in front of the class. Right after class, my late mum came up to him to borrow his notes. She stuck with him throughout the two years of TTC – she knew who she could rely on to complete her assignments! Dad told us that for the optional subject, he had wanted to choose Physical Education, because he was an excellent athlete and would surely excel in this. But his then-girlfriend, my mum, persuaded him to do art instead so that she could do the course with him. Dad said for each assignment, he had to do two submission pieces, one for himself and one for her. Thankfully, dad has a talent for art too! He also had a talent for photography which he picked up with a twin-lens reflex camera that my mum’s dad gave to him.
Dad graduated two years later from TTC and married mum right after graduation. They stayed at a rental house along Everton Road next to his school at Neil Road as their first martial home.
(to be continued in another post – Dad’s Middle Years)
Yee Jenn Jong 