I was born in 1944 during the war. My father came from China and my mother was a Straits-born Peranakan. 

When I was only about six months old, my father had a friend who worked for the Japanese and so he managed to be sent to Cameron Highlands to tend to the vegetable farms. It was a stroke of luck, my mother went along and we didn’t suffer much there because we had enough to eat from the farms. They were there for about a year, and came back to Singapore in 1945 after the war. 

​While my parents were in the highlands, my mother's siblings and her parents were living in Singapore. They resided in a rural kampong area located on a rubber plantation deep within the jungle. To reach their plantation home, you had to walk through the dense jungle for about 15 minutes at a brisk pace, or around half an hour if you strolled leisurely. From there, it was a journey down a dirt road to the bus stop on the main road.

Workers on a rubber plantation

Courtesy of wikimedia commons

​Their farm was situated on Upper Serangoon Road, specifically at the 4th Milestone. In those days, distances were often marked by physical milestones. I think that the measurement started from Cathay's side, with stones indicating 1 mile, 2 miles, 3 miles, and finally 4 miles.

​My mother's siblings were in their twenties during the war, and my maternal grandparents had rented the land from the owner of the rubber plantation, constructing their house on it. They even had a separate chicken house for raising their poultry. My uncle lived nearby and had his own pond with ducks and chickens. There was also a pig farm in the vicinity. In essence, my maternal relatives were quite self-sufficient and didn't suffer from hunger. Apart from growing their vegetables, they would purchase fresh produce from a nearby market, just a short 5-10 minutes away. They did queue for rationed rice, but aside from that, they managed quite well on their own.

​It's possible that the Japanese forces didn't dare venture into the deep jungle, leaving my maternal family in relative peace during those tumultuous times.