Church Weekly for 10 February 2008
My dear readers,
1. Preview of “Memoirs in Gestation”
The long delayed “Memoirs” or“Footprints” are on the way. Like human gestation, it may take nine months. If interruptions to my Sabbatical are not too many, the delivery will be early, but it will not be a premature birth!
As readers will appreciate, only brief excerpts will appear in Pandan’s Weekly Bulletin (and Churches which subscribe to my writings). These, I hope, will act like appetizers before the main meal.
I thank those of you who have been praying for me. Please persevere. God bless!
2. Farewell! China, land of my birth
Leaving one’s Fatherland never to return is no small matter. In 1926 our family took that drastic step. Farewell, China! land of my birth. I was then thirteen months old, just discovering the excitement of walking, but far from the age of understanding the significance of leaving the land of one’s birth, for good.
Why did we leave China? Father had worked it out with Mother. During his years of sojourn in Nanyang (South Seas 
) he had practised in Pontianak (Indonesian Borneo) and Penang (British Malaya). Without question, British Malaya was the preferred land of choice for a future family home, given the opportunity to emigrate.
Father had come into possession of a rubber estate in Senai, South Johor. His trees, oozing latex - “liquid gold” - would join in the global boom, ensuring our family’s support. Father had fallen in love with the estate, especially its stream of sparkling clear water.
In poetic mood, he named the estate “Peach River Garden.” I say “poetic” because the peaches existed only in his mind, and the “river” was but a mere brook, and rubber trees hardly made a garden.
Nevertheless, to express his feelings, Father erected a large signboard at the entrance. “Peach River Garden” announced welcome to all.
Back to the family’s exodus: there were other more compelling reasons for leaving one’s birth-place for a foreign land. First and foremost, Malaya was an attractive part of the British Empire, the greatest and most durable in all history, well governed under the benign rule of Great Britain. No other colonial territory could boast such stability, racial harmony and religious freedom.
Geographically, the climate is conducive to a comfortable and easy life, without extremes of temperature, and away from the earthquake zone. The soil was fertile and every food crop produced in abundance.
On the other hand, South China was exposed to typhoons, floods, earthquakes and inclement climate change. But political turbulance was the chief reason for the urge to emigrate. With the Great Quake of 1918 and the devastating “August 2 Typhoon” of 1922 still flesh in their minds, Father had little difficulty persuading Grandfather to join him in making a new home in Nanyang. After all, Grandfather was a widower with no intention of re-marrying.
How timely was the decision to get away. For even as we were embarking the P and O liner for Singapore, China’s “Second Revolution” led by General Chiang Kai Shek had flared up with renewed violence.
What a relief it was when the family was safely settled into “Peach River Garden’s” plank and attap “estate house,” the family’s dwelling place for the next six years.
Father was especially pleased with the timely move as rubber was “on a roll,” its price pushing “for the clouds,” in step with the global commodity boom. In Senai, three more children were added to the family, making five boys and two girls all told.
Looking into the family’s future, Father and Mother recognized the first priority was the children’s education. It was a far-sighted and wise decision that the children be sent to Singapore, “where the good schools are.” Mother summed up the situation: “If we let the children grow up in Senai among the rubber tappers, the chances are they will become rubber tappers!”
Grandfather meanwhile was called to pastor a Teochew-speaking Presbyterian Church at 4½ milestone, Upper Serangoon Road, Singapore. He gladly welcomed the two older children to lodge with him. Big Sister, Siew Ai, enrolled in the Methodist Girls’ School, and Big Brother, Siang Hui, Timothy, enrolled in the Anglo-Chinese School. As “trail blazers,” they eased the way for the younger siblings to follow.
What impressions remain of those “Senai Years?” Not many that I can recall. They were things of almost eighty years ago.
Nevertheless, because Father and Mother used to speak of certain memorable events, these have remained imprinted in the memory, so I can speak about fishing with Father. (To be continued)
Lovingly in the Lord
Dr SH Tow, Senior Pastor