The Innocent Days...

Close your eyes and imagine walking along a deserted forest trail in the early morning, with your bare feet stepping on the moist bed of soil and the cool morning breeze blowing across your face. That was part of my experiences in my early years living in the kampung. In the early 80s in Singapore, almost all of the rural kampungs had been brought down and new towns built over them. I was very fortunate indeed to live in Ulu Sembawang, one of the last few kampungs still in existence back then. Contrary to popular belief, kids in my kampung didn't run about as much, or maybe it was just me. I stayed in my house with zinc roofing most of the time, playing nanny to my one year old sister. I still remembered one of my favourite past-times when I was with her - bouncing the sarong which she was lying in with suspended spring attached until her bum touched the floor. And I will do it until she cried...seems like I had quite a sadistic personality already.

One of the many memorable incidents when I stayed there was when my mom fell from the roof to the floor while she tried to find the carcass of a cat which chose the top of the roof to die for unknown reasons. Apparently, the unbearable smell of the died cat was overwhelming and my mom climbed up into the dark roof to find the cat, or whatever remains of it. In the process, she slipped and fell from the roof and landed on her feet, fortunately, to the cold surface of the hard floor. I witnessed the whole incident and stood there fear-stricken, not knowing what to do. Later, one of my neighbours who heard the cry of my mom came to help and saw me standing beside my mom, who was crying out loud in pain. No wonder my mom thought I was a mute...it seems that I was slow in speech and only started talking when I was three years of age. This has apparently carried forward into my personality of perference for listening, rather than voicing my opinions, unless "provoked".

One cannot be said to live in the kampung without running around naked. I liked to play with an Eurasian girl, who really looked pretty cute in the photo with the handsome me, when I was young. She was my favourite play-mate and we played everything from hide-and-seek to riding in the miniature vehicles she had. My mom even had to drag me home to bathe because I didn't want to go. However, I was often bullied by a pair of brothers who were btoh older and bigger than me in size. I was often called to do things for them, like collect wooden sticks to play and doing all the "manual" stuff. Once, we got into deep trouble after disturbing a stray dog along the street by throwing rocks at it. Obviously, it was intensely irritated and chased after us. Fortunately, I was a fast runner and managed to run and hide in the public toilet. But, too bad for one of the brothers cos he tried to hide by climbing up a short tree but fell and got his butt bitten by the dog. Serves him right...Retribution I say.

Well...living in the kampung had done much to mould my young mind that you never know unless you tried. The many funny incidents that occured also coloured my life and made it more enjoyable, compared to the kids locked in their rooms playing Playstation nowadays. In the next part of my post, I will continue my story when I moved into an HDB estate and narrate the changes that occured to me and how I lived around it.