My Kampong Days

This is the blog entry which I won 2nd prize in the memories category - a contest on mystory portal organised by NHB in 2007. http://mystory.sg/content/478/Stories.html

I used to live in a kampong (@Jalan Waspada which is near to Paya Lebar side)which I am sure many of you find it hard to believe.

My humble house was made of simple wooden structure with a zinc roof. When it rained, the sound of the rain splashing onto the zinc roof would simply make a lovely orchestra piece. However, it was also time for us to bring out little red basins or buckets as rainwater will be seeping through the gaps and dripping onto the floor and furniture!

As the walls are simply made of wooden planks -sometimes we could peep through the gaps out of mischief to see what our neighbours were doing! We had a bath room at the back of our house and we shared a common water pipe - that is if the neighbour turned on the tap, water supply will run low. That was why we had to store our water in a big clay urn-like container. There was no attached toilet - we had to walk to this small common toilet a few houses away. As there was no light supplied to the toilet, we had to bring along candles. The toilet was basically a wooden hut that was raised with a hole in the centre and a bucket beneath it. I am sure you would not want to look down when you are in it. There would be spiderwebs all around the four walls and you can't help but to stare at the graffiti on the walls under the dim glow of the candle. Sometimes there will be a queue outside the toilet as it was shared by many households.

Life was simple then. I remembered I had to go to the market with a small basket when I was just 7 years old. However, the vendors were very kind to me. If I asked for $1 meat, the portion would definitely be more than $1 worth! I was also given 20ct for my breakfast with my sister. I would share the kway chap and tau pok with my sister as that was the cheapest meal I could find. On our way to the market, I could still remember the lane which was lined with tapioca leaves and tadpoles in puddles of water. If I had extra money, we would go to a provision shop nearby and played "tikam". It was sort of like gambling in which you tear off a slip of paper and see the prize printed on it. Most of the time you will win a waffle biskuit.

Some of my neighbours worked from home in the kampong. I remembered vividly how one of my neighbours started selling noodles by setting up a stall in front of his house - the noodles with the fish dumplings were simply delicious. I could never find the same fish dumpling or 'Yi jiao" anymore. Basically the skin is made of fish paste and resembled that of the wanton skin. Wrapped inside the fish paste skin was minced meat (pork and prawn) which many had used chicken meat to replace nowadays. How I wish somebody can tell me where to find such authentic fish dumplings now!

Sometimes I would also earn some pocket money by trimming jeans or packing baby products inside boxes. All these were send to our houses and we work from home - of course the pay was miserable, sometimes less than a dollar after half a day's work.

I used to accompany my dad to the fishing port and the market too as he was a fishmonger.I would simply guard the fishes which were loaded onto the pick-up as he went to the port to bid for them. After which we will move the cartons of fishes to the market at Upper Boon Keng Road.

When I was in the Secondary School, I remembered working in a biscuit making factory during the holidays. As we worked, I would always looked forward to hearing the stories from the Redifussion. It was a simple cottage industry and the owner actually cooked lunch for the workers. The work is rather mechanical as everyday we would be doing almost the same things - weighing and packing the products.

I shifted to Tampines New Town in 1984 and that marked the end of my kampong days. Though sanitation was poor and there was a lack of facilities, I still miss the kampong days. Oh yes, there were also the fire hazards. As mentioned earlier, the houses were made of wood and flammable structures and thus fire could spread fast. Whenever a fire broke out, someone would sound the alarm and we would quickly grab our valuables and lock the door before rushing for safety. We had to lock the doors as there were incidents of looting during fire outbreaks. Those who had lorries would help to pick up the neighbours to safety. I remembered one year there was an outbreak at 4 a.m. and I was already awake revising my work for the exam. I quickly woke up my family and guesss what I grabbed hold of ? My books and uniform as I had to sit for the exam that day! Oh I forgot to mention that I normally woke up at 5 a.m. and left for school at 5.30 a.m. It was a long walk down the dim road and sometimes I found myself racing down the slope towards the bus-stop!

Article migrated from original My Story Portal 2007.Author. Lilylee68