Page 38 - Stories from our Grandparents

Mr Edmund Lim BORN 1969

spending most of my time
when my interest in Chinese started. I was very good in
By Lim Zhi Sun recall my childhood In Secondary School, I joined a Chinese club and that was
Pasir Ris Secondary School with my family and friends. Chinese and always scored first in the cohort. Chinese was
Gro
I wing up, I was a playful my strongest subject. Once, my Chinese composition was
and carefree kid. I did not care much about anything but just lived published at a local newspaper and I received a small amount
life as it is. I like to play with my friends after school. The usual of cash from that. Overall, school life was easy. There was not a
games that we played were hide and seek and marbles. lot of homework and I had no stress.

Sometimes, my friends and I would go around the My family and I used to live in a kampong. It was made out of wood
neighbourhood to catch spiders and try to make with a zinc roof. It was really comfortable as my family only consisted
them battle with each other. Most of the time, of my parents, my 3 siblings and myself. Other families were much
the spiders would actually fight and injure each bigger than ours. We did not have any air conditioner nor washing
other. We also caught or bought fighting fishes machine at that time. We had to rely on fans and scrub our clothes
and would get them to attack one another. The with a washing board manually.
fight was so intense that sometimes, the fishes' tails In the year 1981, we had to move out of our kampong to live in
would drop off. We would also go to open fields to Housing Development Board houses. I felt like I was going to
fly kites.
jail when I entered the house, because the space was really
There was this popular game called small and confined. For the first time, we had to lock our doors
"Hantanbola" where we would take as well. It was different compared to kampongs. At kampongs
tennis balls and try to hit somebody we could roam freely in a large space, but now, these HDB
with it. If a person gets hit, houses are smaller.
they would have to in turn try to
hit other people. There was also a thing called 'kampong spirit' where the whole
neighbourhood looked out for each other and we would
In my free time, I like to draw.
My uncle had a Yamaha motorcycle report to the police if we see any suspicious person lurking
and there was a logo of a horse around. These days, neighbours aren’t as close to each other.
at the back. I thought it was really I really miss the kampong spirit and I hope that the younger
beautiful and I drew that in Art lessons. I was skilful in Art and generation will preserve this spirit of unity as a nation.
often got A for Art. My co-curricular activity in Primary School was
Baseball and I would play with other members but I never managed
to represent the school for competitions as I was not good enough.

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