MY MOTHER

My mother passed away peacefully on 14 October 2012 at 6.02pm of stroke and heart attack. She had chosen her own way to leave this world with dignity, while she was still physically functional to do the basic needs. Her wish of death before dinner was to leave something for the next generation was also realised. Most important of all, she discreetly left instructions for her own funeral wake and left no dilemmas for the living by meticulously giving hints of the funeral rites. Even how her assets are to be shared left no disharmony among the future generations. Such micromanagement skill is the hallmark of my beloved mother.

My mother, Ngiam Juat Eng was born in 1926, Year of the Tiger  to a peasant family on Hainan Island small and poor village. She was the middle child and only daughter. She had 2 older and 2 younger brothers of which only the youngest is still alive. Her father was a very tall man. Besides being a farmer, he is also a very skilful carpenter for household furniture. Her mother was like most women in China tended to the farms as well as being the home maker.

 

Like most of the girls during her time, the family did not have the means to provide her any formal education. Traditionally she was supposed to be married in the teens. Unfortunately when she was at the marriageable age, WW2 came.  She recalled she had to run and hide whenever news of Japanese soldiers were approaching her village. She also had to wear ragged and old clothing to masked her look older and unattractive should she be captured by the Japs.

 

 

During and after the war, economics situation was really bad. The people were poor and unemployment was prevalent. There were fewer young and eligible men who have the means to get married. This was especially so in the villages as many had gone away to seek jobs. My mum was already in her twenties and by then her parents would have been desperate.
 

 

In her times, all marriage was arranged. Her father finally managed to arrange her marriage to my father who was 21 years older than her. My father had lost his first wife in Kulai, Malaysia. She was brutally bayoneted by the Japs. My father had always dwelt on the cruelty and the suffering he endured during the Japanese occupation. But he never recounted on the death of his first wife, I guessed it’s just too painful to share with us.

 

I estimated my mother was married around 1948 and gave birth to my brother, Yoon in 1949. I heard from the relatives and also pieced some of what she said that the marriage was one that was absolutely and unwelcome choice. Defying the parents wish was definitely frown upon in those days. But like every arranged marriage in those days, the couple make the best out of their marriage, learn and nurture the love, overcome the pain and stress and dutifully and responsibly raise a family. There was no need for marriage vows like today. Divorces was not yet coined in the dictionary.

 

 

 

My mother suffered immensely and quietly, endure the hardship and faithfully performed the role of wife and mother without complains. Her new family included a mother in law and two step children. It was her duty to care for them. Not long after marriage, my father left Hainan Island for Singapore for find a job. My mother had to be independent and work very hard in the new family. My mother told me she had to walk miles to deliver her first child without my father presence. Beside farming the family lots, she also told me she had to collect fire woods and walk miles to sell it to supplement the meagre remittance that my father had struggled to remit from Singapore. I must clarify that my father loved her and was a very responsible husband.  He was fully aware of her predicament and her struggles.  With the separation, the only communication was an occasional letters. It must be tough for her during those years.

 

 

 

In 1953, my father successfully applied for her passage to Singapore to join him. They were reunited and my father bought an attap house with loan from relative in a very rural area in Sembawang. In this house I was born in 1954. There was no tap water nor electricity in this house. Water was drawn from well. Woods was burnt  for cooking. Light was from the sun and kerosene lamp at night. Life in Singapore was no better but for a hard working mother like her, there was enough to eat. In 1955 and 1959 she had a daughter and a son respectively. Together my mother had four children 3 boys and a girl. She single handed raised all of us while still having to tends to the farm.

 

In Singapore she continued to do farming, reared chickens and pigs to supplement the family income and raised the four of us. In the later years, she also worked in the rubber estate, tapping rubber. Over the years, life improved and she stopped working when I started working. Thereafter, she had more comfort and a better quality of life. My mother toiled from morning to night with no holidays. The work she put in was back breaking and yet she accepted her lot without complaining. Looking back, this was really admirable.

 

My mother has the satisfaction of seeing all her sons getting married. Together they gave her 6 grandchildren and all had completed university education which I knew she was very proud. She was very fortunate to even have 2 great grandchildren which she was very fond of and delighted whenever they visited her.

It’s really hard to describe my mother in a few words. She had many outstanding attributes but I too had to be honest, she too had many human weaknesses and idiosyncrasies. I choose to remember and cherish her strengths and attributes.

Her greatest attribute was the unforgettable motherly love she showered on me as well as all those under her charge. Her motherly love is absolutely unconditional. Unconditional means she was prepared to do anything, anytime, anywhere and under any conditions to ensure our comfort and well being with no regards to her pains and whatever inconveniences, and not hope to bargain for something in return of her effort. There were just too many instances of such love that I will always remember. Her unconditional love was also extended to my nephew as well as both my daughters whom she helped me cared for. I believe my nephew and daughters would stand by what I wrote.

To me, I am forever indebted to my mother.