7 - MY FIRST APPOINTMENT
Lieutenant Chan and I travelled to our first appointments in Kuching on a cargo boat. The Officer Commanding drove us to Clifford Pier from where we boarded a launch which took us to the outer shores. We climbed up a plank suspended by ropes to board the Bentong. Then the OC went back to Clifford Pier. Lt-Colonel Harvey was a very kind and fatherly Officer Commanding indeed!
Lieutenant Chan and I were poor sailors; we soon became seasick! It took us 36 hours crossing the South China Sea before arriving at Pending where the boat berthed. Major Elsie Willis the matron of the Kuching Children’s Home, met us. She had been the very first Salvation Army officer who was in charge of the Singapore Children’s Home before the war. Now I came under her wings again!
In 1950 The Army was invited by the governor, Sir Anthony Abel, to open a Home for children in Kuching when Sarawak was under British administration like Singapore. The pioneer was Major Willis. Permission was granted for a Corps to be started as well and Captain Agnes Morgan was appointed the first Corps Officer of Kuching. Lieutenant Chan and I were the first national officers to be appointed to Sarawak.
Prior to our commissioning, Captain Morgan had an accident as she cycled home after a Sunday night meeting. She had to be hospitalised with a fractured neck. So my first duty was to visit, read the Bible and prayed with my Corps Officer! After her discharge from the hospital she had to continue wearing a plastic collar for sometime. I learnt how to comb her hair made two plaits and wound them up and round her head forming a hair band. Captain suggested that I also do my hair the same way or in a bun! It would save money, instead of spending $10.00 on a perm. The first time I had my hair permed was on the instruction of the Training Principal because I looked too much like a schoolgirl! I guess it would have been very practical and helpful to accept my Captain’s advice!
I received my very first pay packet as a brand new Lieutenant with a gross allowance of S$150.00 per month. I requested Headquarters in Singapore to deduct part of my allowance for my sister to collect each month. In his concern for me the OC thought $20.00 was a fair amount. In those days every officer had to contribute $5.00 monthly to the pension fund. So, from the grant for Kuching Corps I received $125.00 each month. Then my first obligation was my tithe, $15.00 followed by housekeeping. It was reckoned that half of our total allowance would be required for this item. Captain and I shelled out $70.00 each, and took turns to keep the monthly accounts, covering expenses like food, electricity, gas, newspapers and other household necessities. Social officers stationed in a Home, paid $2.00 per month for the use of the Home refrigerator. Captain had a small one given by her sister from New Zealand. I felt likewise I should pay her $2.00 for my use of it.
I learnt from Captain to write home once a week which meant I needed to budget for postage, especially at Christmas time! She was a good teacher on thrift too. Absolutely nothing was ever wasted; every paper clip, pin, or rubber band was recycled. Through careful budgeting I saved up enough to buy a Bible concordance at $15.00 on my first visit to Singapore for the Command Anniversary! By the time I left Kuching, after almost three years in that town, I also had bought a second-hand Singer Sewing machine costing $100.00, paid for by installments! (By the way this is still in use!)
The corps hall was located above a wooden attap hut. In bygone years the building had been a private Chinese school. Now the ground floor was a motor mechanic shop; partitioned behind was a room where a very elderly teacher and his wife lived. A narrow staircase led up to our corps hall with a couple of wooden tables and several long benches. Before my departure from Singapore I was teased - I might fall through the floor boards because I weighed only 38 kg, or I could shake the building down should I put on too much weight! It was true that the whole place swayed when the children ran across the hall!
Our corps quarters was a rented unit of a row of flats in Ban Hock Road, next to a Hindu temple. The front portion was our sitting cum dining room. Half the back was our kitchen, bathroom and toilet, while the other half was an open courtyard. The whole of upstairs was only half the length of the building, partitioned into two bedrooms; Captain had the front room, and I had the back one which looked down to the courtyard.
Right behind was a big house in which lived the Chan family. I learnt to ride the bike, going up and down the driveway. A few years later, the government acquired the stately home for The Army to run a Boys’ Home, which is still there, though some extensions have been made. In 1965 the building in front of the Home was erected by the government as quarters for the superintendant.
In the 50’s most people travelled about on bicycles. Cars were few and far between. At first I went around by bus. There were no fixed times, routes nor bus stops to board. We simply told the driver our destination and he would drop us off as and when he got there! This was incentive enough for me to learn to ride my bike soonest possible!
Like many towns in Malaya and Singapore then, even now, majority of the population were Chinese, with Hokkien widely used. In the Kuching corps district many were fisherfolk, whose dialect was Hingwha. My own dialect is Cantonese so I had to learn Hokkien, especially Biblical terms. Usually Captain spoke in Mandarin and I translated into Hokkien, though we did our preparation in English!
The corps programme was a busy one. Sunday morning began with a prayer meeting at 8.00 am. at our quarters. After breakfast we cycled to the corps about a mile away, for the Holiness Meeting at 10.00 am. Then it was back to the quarters for a cold lunch –usually a can of luncheon meat or corned beef, mashed potatoes and boiled vegetables, all prepared the day before. After a short rest it was back to the corps, for the Sunday school at 3.00 p.m. The evening Salvation Meeting at 6.00 p.m. was preceded by an open-air meeting at 5.00 pm. As the corps was new we had no local officers except for Major Willis who acted as Corps Secretary. As the corps assistant officer, I did most of the housework like cleaning, cooking and washing up. However, Captain would not let me do her personal laundry.
Monday morning was spent in doing the corps books, like filling in the statistics. Captain would write her report and answer CHQ mail etc. on her personal typewriter. Monday afternoon was our free time, but I had my monthly probationary, then advanced lessons to do and sent to CHQ to be marked.
At first the corps folk thought I was kid and asked why I was not going to school! I was often mistakened as one of the girls in the Home. Three weeks after my arrival to the corps I had my 18th birthday. I was still addressed as Ah Moi when out in the streets! Perhaps if I had added to my weight of 85 lbs. and height of 5ft., it would have helped!
Every Tuesday afternoon a Home League Meeting was held at the corps hall as an outreach programme for women. Wednesday was spent visiting the corps folk in their homes, but there was a weekly Junior and a Senior Soldiers’ Meeting at the corps. It was easier for Captain and I to cycle to the Children’s Home which was some distance from town than for a crowd to be transported to the corps. So, every Thursday afternoon was spent at the Home where we conducted the activities of a Brownie Pack and a Girl Guide Company. After our evening meal with the Home officers we also conducted the Junior and Senior meetings before cycling home. The programmes of the Brownies and Girl Guides were repeated every Friday at the corps hall. Saturday afternoon was Joy Hour with the children before cleaning the hall ready for Sunday morning Worship and Sunday School in the afternoon, an open-air meeting prior to the Sunday Night Meeting.
MY CO, Captain Morgan was a great fan of the Baden Powell Movement - Girl Guides and Brownies, Boy Scouts and Cubs. Growing up, I had been a Sunbeam and Life-Saving Guard (the The Army’s counterpart.) Being the Assistant Corps Officer I was involved with all the YP Corps activities even though some of them were not my cup of tea! I had never camped overnight before, not under a tent. I now had to help run a camp where we had to set up canvas tents, make our own tables and seats from bamboo sticks and ropes, cook over an open fire and draw water from a stream. One of the first essential duties was to build a fence around a small area for bathroom and toilet which was a hole dug in the ground. One of the tests for the girls was a three mile walk, and to boil water for a cup of tea midway on the trip. This was done on our last day of camp. I was really glad when it was all over!
In August 1957 I farewelled from Kuching to Melacca Corps; and Lt. Goh Siong Kheng from the FAITHFUL Session of cadets was commissioned to Kuching Corps.
Thus ended my three happy years in my first appointment!
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