May 20, 2005
It’s going to be hard to remember everything. 70, 80 years! There are things that I remember when told to me in childhood, things I will remember forever.. but you could have told me something yesterday and it would have disappeared completely from my memory.
That’s usually how stories live in people’s minds anyway, isn’t it. When your dad was younger, when he would go to night school to study Chinese, he would basically spend the 1-2 hours of class time, listening to stories. Olden stories like how the fishmonger would catch boatloads of fish with only one net, or how the sly fox ran away with the chicken, stories that kids like to listen to. I don’t know how much he remembered from then…
I remember stories I heard when I was young. When I first came to Singapore, and I was apperenticing in the medical shop, there were these rich gentlemen that came into the medical shop. Not to get medicine or get treatment, but they were rich enough and read medical books, so they’d come it to talk to the old masters. Just to chat, really. They’d talk about different methods of treatment they’d study, compare notes, shoot the breeze. As a young man, you’d have your hands busy but your ears open to listen to what to what they were talking about. Good ears, then, you see… not like now – no need for a hearing aid back then. And I’d remember things that they’d talk about, good treatments that worked, useful methods of curing people, effective medical herbs. I’d forget about the ones that didn’t work, and I’d remember the ones that did. Many years, I did that – that’s how I learned.
That’s how people learned in the old days. There were no classes – no lessons, just listening, remembering, thinking. That’s how people remember the old China – not the dramatic playground version that is on TV today, but the real China.
The real China is very different. I think it’s probably so progressive today – people have money, they have built tall towers and drive nice cars and have learned how to be arrogant. But the country folks, are still country folks, even with these beautiful clothes and wads of cash. They don’t know that flagstone courtyards are better than mosaic tiles because the floors don’t become slippery in the rain, but they spend money on placing these little tiles all over because it looks nice – but when it gets wet, they walk all around it in a big detour. It’s an insult to the old house in the village – your uncle(1) has turned the house into such a place.
When Grandma(2) was in the village during the Japanese Skies(3), that house saw all kinds of hardship. Those Japanese soldiers, they were bad – they would run all over the mountains and villages into our lands. Took all the crops. There were these grass stalks that people would sell to the landowners to feed their herds – the longer the grass was, the more money it was worth. Where there were big trees, with lots of shade, the grass would grow tall – sometimes as tall as a human being! The villagers would trek from the bottom of the hills, which is where the village was, into mid-hills to gather the grass, bundle them, and sell them for money. During good times, the hills would be covered in green, everyone was fat and happy, the herds were plump and everyone was smiling.
During the Japanese Skies, the hills were barren. Everywhere you looked, there was brown earth – the grass were short little weeds, barely worth a copper penny – stepped all over my Japanese soldiers, poor villagers having scraped up the last pieces. Your grandmother had trek up to 10-20 miles, leaving the house in the morning, to go to the top of the hills to get the last of the grass, so there’s money to feed your uncle. The bits of grass would take her all day to gather, then she’d bundle them back down the hills in the afternoon, sell them for a few coins. That means that day there would be salted vegetables and sweet potatoes to go with the porridge for the house – it was so sad, to think that everywhere you’d look, all you could see was the naked tall trees and the barren earth, stripped bare, the grass was dead, the country was dying, the people were crying.
But the villagers survived – that was how life carried on then, somehow people would make it through. Teochew people are tough, you know – the villagers are even tougher.
I don’t think the people in the China can survive the tough times we had then. The people today have it good – they have the good life. The gifts I used to bring back to China, the towels, sweets, money, they laugh at that now – they have condominiums, stocks, race cars – even in Swatow, where it was fortune back then to have more than one bicycle! To hear them talk today – it’s all hot air, a lot of empty words with no reality.
That’s why people have to live within their means. Be content with what you have. Discontent will only breed greed and emptiness. Be committed to the family, give them a good life, enough to fill your belly and theirs, and life can be very good.
-------------------------------
(1) Grandpa adopted Ang Now when he was young, Ang Now lives in the old house that Grandpa built in the village Cheok Bee Kee in Teo Yeo, Guangzhou Province, Chaozhou District.
(2) Grandpa had two wives – first wife, Tan Boon Kim, was married in China, she lived in the village when Grandpa first went to Singapore, with Uncle Teck Tshim.
(3) A term that refers to the Second World War during the Japanese occupation
That’s usually how stories live in people’s minds anyway, isn’t it. When your dad was younger, when he would go to night school to study Chinese, he would basically spend the 1-2 hours of class time, listening to stories. Olden stories like how the fishmonger would catch boatloads of fish with only one net, or how the sly fox ran away with the chicken, stories that kids like to listen to. I don’t know how much he remembered from then…
I remember stories I heard when I was young. When I first came to Singapore, and I was apperenticing in the medical shop, there were these rich gentlemen that came into the medical shop. Not to get medicine or get treatment, but they were rich enough and read medical books, so they’d come it to talk to the old masters. Just to chat, really. They’d talk about different methods of treatment they’d study, compare notes, shoot the breeze. As a young man, you’d have your hands busy but your ears open to listen to what to what they were talking about. Good ears, then, you see… not like now – no need for a hearing aid back then. And I’d remember things that they’d talk about, good treatments that worked, useful methods of curing people, effective medical herbs. I’d forget about the ones that didn’t work, and I’d remember the ones that did. Many years, I did that – that’s how I learned.
That’s how people learned in the old days. There were no classes – no lessons, just listening, remembering, thinking. That’s how people remember the old China – not the dramatic playground version that is on TV today, but the real China.
The real China is very different. I think it’s probably so progressive today – people have money, they have built tall towers and drive nice cars and have learned how to be arrogant. But the country folks, are still country folks, even with these beautiful clothes and wads of cash. They don’t know that flagstone courtyards are better than mosaic tiles because the floors don’t become slippery in the rain, but they spend money on placing these little tiles all over because it looks nice – but when it gets wet, they walk all around it in a big detour. It’s an insult to the old house in the village – your uncle(1) has turned the house into such a place.
When Grandma(2) was in the village during the Japanese Skies(3), that house saw all kinds of hardship. Those Japanese soldiers, they were bad – they would run all over the mountains and villages into our lands. Took all the crops. There were these grass stalks that people would sell to the landowners to feed their herds – the longer the grass was, the more money it was worth. Where there were big trees, with lots of shade, the grass would grow tall – sometimes as tall as a human being! The villagers would trek from the bottom of the hills, which is where the village was, into mid-hills to gather the grass, bundle them, and sell them for money. During good times, the hills would be covered in green, everyone was fat and happy, the herds were plump and everyone was smiling.
During the Japanese Skies, the hills were barren. Everywhere you looked, there was brown earth – the grass were short little weeds, barely worth a copper penny – stepped all over my Japanese soldiers, poor villagers having scraped up the last pieces. Your grandmother had trek up to 10-20 miles, leaving the house in the morning, to go to the top of the hills to get the last of the grass, so there’s money to feed your uncle. The bits of grass would take her all day to gather, then she’d bundle them back down the hills in the afternoon, sell them for a few coins. That means that day there would be salted vegetables and sweet potatoes to go with the porridge for the house – it was so sad, to think that everywhere you’d look, all you could see was the naked tall trees and the barren earth, stripped bare, the grass was dead, the country was dying, the people were crying.
But the villagers survived – that was how life carried on then, somehow people would make it through. Teochew people are tough, you know – the villagers are even tougher.
I don’t think the people in the China can survive the tough times we had then. The people today have it good – they have the good life. The gifts I used to bring back to China, the towels, sweets, money, they laugh at that now – they have condominiums, stocks, race cars – even in Swatow, where it was fortune back then to have more than one bicycle! To hear them talk today – it’s all hot air, a lot of empty words with no reality.
That’s why people have to live within their means. Be content with what you have. Discontent will only breed greed and emptiness. Be committed to the family, give them a good life, enough to fill your belly and theirs, and life can be very good.
-------------------------------
(1) Grandpa adopted Ang Now when he was young, Ang Now lives in the old house that Grandpa built in the village Cheok Bee Kee in Teo Yeo, Guangzhou Province, Chaozhou District.
(2) Grandpa had two wives – first wife, Tan Boon Kim, was married in China, she lived in the village when Grandpa first went to Singapore, with Uncle Teck Tshim.
(3) A term that refers to the Second World War during the Japanese occupation
posted by tygertyger at 10:40 AM
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