Chapter 1 My Grand Mother - The Very Beginning

In late of 1890's a successful businessman named Cheah Pak Chok from Malaya.returned to his home land in Canton.His home land was at a remote interior of Kwangtong where many of his country men went by the same Surname sought his aid for employment in Malaya,so that one day they hope to seek their fortune and be famous like him.

Being related to them with all processing the same Surname he definitely obliged and thus recruited them to work for him in Malaya.At the same time his real intention back home was to seek a wife to replace his demised wife.With the help of some relatives he was very soon married to a woman very much junior to his age in his homeland.That woman happened to be my paternal grand mother.

Thereafter,they took the trip back to Malaya,together with them also came a host of relatives,all mostly Cheahs.All of whom were absolved into his Sawmill at Batak Rabit,brick works in Sungei Nibong and contractions all around Teluk Anson.The former General Hospital along Anson Road (presently demolished ) was constructed by him.He also owned large tracts of land in Sabak Bernam and also Teluk Anson.

Every thing apparently went on quite smoothly well as the old man the Boss was always around to overseer all went well.Later,my Grandmother bored him a daughter.Beside her my grandfather had another son and daughter,rumoured to have been adopted by his first wife.

Unfortunately my grand mother could not bear him another son,so a son was similarly adopted and that was my late father.Though adopted she treated my father very well,so much so in certain ways he was a well pampered child.

We, Chinese generally believed that there ought to have male son in the family to sent him off in his final hours on earth and to "buy water"."Buying water" is customary long practice for Chinese.a final act for the filial heir (male) very often the eldest son to get water to give the father a last rites to cleanse the dead.The water must be "brought" by him from the nearest source of water.Prayers will be chanted by the Taoist priest as he does that ritual.


Should the wife be unable to produce an heir apparent,she anticipate to resorting to adopting one ,one way or other. Without one the dead will presumed to have died unwillingly or dying without any peace of mind.Therefore it was imminent that should none be one available at least adopt one will suffice.

Another reason was that the son was to continue with his legacy,his Surname and prosper with what fortune that was left to him,even adopted.Dying with an heir to bear his name can also meant that he would not be a wandering ghost without any one to pray and remember him by on auspicious days.

So my father was an adopted son as a child.The family's fortune was at its prime when the old man was alive but unfortunately its fortune was soon changed due to his untimely death in 1920 at an age slightly sixty plus..Without him at the helm the family's fortune took a drastic dipped,diminishing because of mismanagement and the squabbles for his fortune.

To make matter worst those relatives brought from China did nothing much to help but instead aided in further corroding of the family's fortune.Many stories had them being nicked called 1st king,or second kin or third king and so on just because they were related to the Boss by a surname- Cheah ,but there were a few who were really blood relations.

Just imagine other workers calling them "kings",that could only meant many were behaving thus emulating a "King".Many of them employed getting paid and doing nothing but bragging and boasting around ,just simply because my late grand father treated all the relatives very well.

So much so,some were reputed to be addicted to opium smoking.We should know them because we were worshiping at their graves every "Cheng Beng". Most of which were littered in the graveyard of Durian Sabatang,and we had not stopped doing so paying our respect just simply carrying on what my late father was doing.I think we were the only ones remembering them.

In the days when my father was alive,paying our respect to all these graves were quite fun as many old timers when meeting him at that sight would joke over tales about all those Cheahs.Most of them were buried just before pre-2nd world war.So long were those graves but our father still insisted on paying them due respect.

During those hay days days ,there was an Uncle who ferried a full "tongkang" load of sawn Chengal Timber down to Singapore and enjoyed himself to the fullest on women until all the money from sales of the timber was all spent,only then he would return home without a cent left,it seem his passage home had to be sent to him.All these were well known stories of the Cheahs.

Actually with so much mismanagement,misappropriation and with so many unnecessary mouths who does little to feed, the family fortune still lasted nearly fifteen over years.The vast empire my late grand father built thus dwindled away slowly a little at a time,with the rows of shopping properties to firstly slipped away.

My father as a pampered child was fooling around with his buddies while studying in Chinese schools in Ipoh.In any case he then too young to be involved in the family's business.Neither was he studious and reached only junior middle three.It seem he too had a fair share of fun spending lavishly with other school mates because money was still easy to come by.

Our Auntie was a smart girl passed her Senior Cambridge School Cert. in Teluk Anson and straight away went on to become a nurse.Of course she was the pet of the grandmother.Later she was married to a prominent lawyer.
I knew this because I had many teachers during my schooling days who knew her as students in Teluk Anson.

My father married my mother at a tender age about twenty after a long courtship just before the war.By then the family was holding on to its sole sawmill and many depended on it for survival although it was clinging on for survival.With the onslaught of the Japanese Army advancing from Kedah on 13/10/41,the retreating British, forced the sawmill to destroy with most of its machinery- mostly by dumping them into the nearby river.

That was to prevent the occupying Japanese forces from utilizing them.
The Sawmill was already at it lowest ebb and to have all its machinery
destroyed at this stage was actually telling the company to vanish from the face of the earth,but beggars had no choice had to abide by that ruling.

With the invading Japanese over running most of the states in Malaya the family was put to flight into the jungle.With scarcity of food the family cleared some jungle land to plant food crops like sweet potatoes and "Taipioca and "padi".There was not much money in the coffer but even there were some our grandmother held on to them relentlessly to them not yielding to anyone.

My sister was already a child of age one with me on the way out to this world.She was born in 1940.




















To be continued.