DSPN for Ooi Eow Jin

I am very happy to learn that Malaysia's forgotten music maestro, Ooi Eow Jin, is finally getting the long overdue recognition he deserves from the country. Well, maybe not from the federal government in Putrajaya but at least the state government in Penang.

Come tomorrow, 5 Sept 2015, the Penang Governor will confer on Eow Jin the award of Darjah Setia Pangkuan Negeri (DSPN) which carries the title Datuk.

I am very happy for Uncle Ooi whom I've never met. Ever since I heard that he was suffering from one tragedy after another - one son dying from leukemia and the other son suffering from a brain tumour -  I've been wanting to see how I could make life more pleasant for him. In my own way, of course.

So on the eighth of July, I decided to write a story here on this blog to highlight Eow Jin's plight. I had written about how some well-wishers were coming together to organise a benefit concert for Uncle Ooi in Petaling Jaya and encouraging people to buy the tickets. My story must have struck a chord because hundreds, if not thousands, of people around the country rallied round and raised close to RM100,000 for Eow Jin's benefit..

However, I was not satisfied with just writing this story. I felt that more could be done for Eow Jin who, like me, happens to be an Old Boy of the Penang Free School. Three days after I wrote that piece in my blog, I decided to send an appeal email to the Penang Chief Minister. I think it is time for me to make the contents of my appeal public:

Dear Chief Minister,

I am writing to alert you to a news story which in all probability could appear in tomorrow's edition of The Sunday Star (Soo Ewe Jin's column piece). The story will be about a music maestro in our midst, a music maestro who is long forgotten by the Malaysian people at large, a music maestro who is truly an Anak Pulau Pinang.

I am referring to Ooi Eow Jin - or Uncle Ooi, as many people would refer to him - born in Penang in 1938, worked in Penang in his early 20s and then moved to Kuala Lumpur when he was offered the opportunity to work in the Radio Television Malaysia Orchestra. He rose to become the bandleader of the RTM Orchestra and then left to join TV3. When his stint at TV3 was over, we was appointed as an adjunct professor in music in one of the local tertiary institutions. After his retirement, he remained active in music and was employed by the Hotel Majestic in Kuala Lumpur as their resident pianist, tinkling away at the keyboards six afternoons a week. And he was already in his 70s.

But there is more to this man than just his career. During his stint with RTM, he arranged a medley of songs that won a young singer the Bintang RTM award in 1976. Soon after that, he composed the first song which this young singer recorded in a studio. This song was "Teriring Doa" and it was Sudirman Arshad's first local hit. Until his final days, Sudirman - Malaysia's Number One entertainer - never forgot the part that Uncle Ooi had played in his career.

Ooi Eow Jin composed many other hits for our local singers. For instance, there was “Masa Berlalu” for Salamiah Hassan, the mother of current jazz singer Atilia. Other songs included Dahlan Zainuddin’s “Lagu Untukmu”and Yunizar Hoessein’s “Kisah Gadis Sepi”. He wrote the entire soundscape for Yassin Salleh’s blockbuster film "Dia Ibuku" in 1981, along with the theme song sung by M Nasir. In 1965, Ooi Eow toured Sabah with P Ramlee to entertain the Malaysian armed forces.

But Uncle Ooi has his fair share of personal tragedy. During his long career, Eow Jin had supported his two sons through their education until both graduated from University. Unfortunately, his younger son died after a prolonged battle against leukemia despite his efforts to give his son the best treatment available. Eow Jin, himself now showing signs of Alzheimer's disease, continued his playing career at the Majestic Hotel until recently, 30 June 2015, when he made his final bow. I am told that his younger son is now afflicted with a brain tumour. Again, it was with the effort of Eow Jin that the son is still hanging on to life. Eow Jin now lives with his wife and son in a home shared with other unfortunate people.

Ever since I broke the story of Ooi Eow Jin's plight on my blog http://ssquah.blogspot.com and facebook, I've seen Malaysians of all ages come together to rally around him. Next week on 19 July 2015, there is an effort to organise a small benefit concert in Petaling Jaya to raise funds for Uncle Ooi. But there are grander plans afoot. I understand that some friends are planning two bigger benefit concerts in Penang and Kuala Lumpur later in the year. 

I am not involved in any of these benefit concerts for our forgotten Anak Pulau Pinang but I was wondering whether you and the Penang government can chip in by:

1) Offering the Dewan Sri Pinang as the venue for the Penang concert once details are finalised; and 

2) Recognising Ooi Eow Jin with a last-minute DSPN award. I know that the deadline for submission of award applications has long passed but I also know that the state government retains some prerogative. And I am suggesting that Eow Jin (already 77 or 78 years old) deserves it for his contribution to the Malaysian music industry.

Ooi Eow Jin is an Old Free (I am also an Old Free and I was one of the co-authors of the FIDELIS commemorative book which the Raja of Perlis launched in 2012) and I am confident that you, as the Chairman of the Penang Free School Board of Trustees, will want to rally round to help him too. Many thanks for reading my email....

Until today, I had remained mum about the content of this email because, well, I wasn't sure about how my request to Guan Eng would pan out. How would he respond to my brazen request? To be frank, I did not receive a reply from him. What was I supposed to do? What could I do? Why, send Guan Eng a Reminder! That was what I did:

Dear Chief Minister,

I had sent this email to your official email address last Saturday but have not received any acknowledgement from your office despite a Whatsapp reminder to your PA, Julio. As a result, I am forwarding the same email message to you with the hope that the Penang government can look into it and do something nice for our forgotten music maestro, Ooi Eow Jin. The details are in my original message. Thank you.

Alas, no reply too. So I gave up the attempt to communicate further with my Chief Minister although I had two or three chances to accost him during some public events I had attended. But I was gutless. I did not. However inside me, I was hoping - really, really hoping - that he would take up this cause all the same.

And now, my hope to see some recognition for Ooi Eow Jin is realised. From tomorrow onwards, you can call him Datuk Uncle Ooi, haha..... :-)

My fascination with train travel in Malaysia

The railways and trains have always fascinated me. Growing up as a pre-school kid, one of my favourite toys was a train set going round and round endlessly on a circular track. Later, when I was given a train set with a figure eight track, you can imagine the joy that I got from this upgrade. :-)

Growing up on the island meant that I had little opportunity to interact with real trains, meaning those of the Malayan Railway (Keretapi Tanah Melayu, KTM), until I was about eight or nine years old. Then my parents took me on a very rare outing to Taiping. At that age, it was a once-in-a-lifetime experience sitting in a real train as we crossed the channel in a ferry to the train station in Prai.

There, we boarded the train and maybe about two hours later, we arrived in Taiping. We stayed in a small room somewhere in this small town. It wasn't even a budget-style hotel: just a room above a shop. And from there, we visited the Taiping lake gardens on the second day before we took the train back to Prai. It was a small adventure that I still remember.

When I was older, there was this occasion that I first took the train from Penang to Kuala Lumpur by myself  travelling with one of my cousins and got ourselves caught up in the Great Flood of January 1971. Now bigger and more aware of my surroundings, I remember that the coaches had hard wooden seats, the coaches were not air-conditioned and we had to open the louvred wooden windows to let in the breeze or to close them to shut out the sun. In any case, at the end of the eight or nine-hour journey, our faces were sticky and coated with a fine layer of dust and soot from the coal-fired engines.

I remember sitting by the window watching the scenery roll by...the tall lallang fast approaching or drawing away, the rows and rows of rubber trees, the padi fields stretching for miles, the rail tunnel - now, that was the killer experience, going into the tunnel - and of course, the train rolling slowly across the Bukit Merah lake. One of my favourite past-times was to look out for the stations along the way. Once, I sat with a pen and paper in hand, noting down the names of the stations and the times that the train stopped there. Such was my fascination with train travel.

When I was studying in Kuala Lumpur, that was the time when train travel became more frequent for me. I remember going down to the Howe Cheang Dispensary at Penang Road to buy my train tickets. Howe Cheang was the agent for Malaysian Railways and one of the staff there would dutifully issue me with the train ticket.

So during the semester breaks, I would take the train to and fro Penang and Kuala Lumpur. During those days, the economy seats were unnumbered and once on board the train, chances were very great that you could be separated from any friend you were travelling with. There would be a clamber for any empty seat and once there, you would remain seated until the end of the journey, save for the occasional walk to the buffet coach or the toilet. But when the journey gets monotonous, as eight or nine-hour journeys can become after several experiences, I would choose to stand by the coach entrance, open the door and hang on to the railing, blissfully unaware of the possible danger of falling off from the train especially when it rocked on the tracks.

This clambering for seats in the unnumbered coaches became more critical during the holiday seasons for usually, Malaysian Railways would over-sell their seats. During the holiday seasons, it was not uncommon for rail passengers to sit in the aisle or attempt to share space with the luckier passengers who had already claimed their wooden seats.

Once during the run-up to the Chinese New Year holidays in the mid-1970s - it must be between 1974 and 1976 - I couldn't find a seat and had to settle down onto a space at the end of the carriage, where the doors were. Suddenly, a girl soon plonked herself next to me on the floor as she couldn't get a seat either. Soon, we started talking and she told me that she had also studied at the Penang Free School. But obviously, she  was my junior in the school as I don't remember her in any of the Sixth Form classes while I was at school in 1971 and 1972. Her name? Cardosa. Either Mary Cardosa or Elizabeth Cardosa. The years do funny things to one's memory and honestly, I can't remember which of the Cardosa sisters became my carriage mate during the long journey from Kuala Lumpur to Penang. But I must frankly say that the conversations with her certainly made the trip much less boring.

After I left Kuala Lumpur, I practically stopped taking the train except for once in the late 1980s when I followed some of my former bank colleagues on a trip to Cameron Highlands. I remember that there were about 10 of us and we decided to take the train down to Tapah Road Station where we would then catch a bus up to Cameron. There was another long interval before I took a train in Malaysia again; it could be in the 1990s when I joined a Malaysian contingent of chessplayers back from Singapore to Kuala Lumpur.

But the excitement of rail travel never left me. In 1978, when I was part of the Malaysian chess contingent that was invited to the People's Republic of China, I had a big thrill travelling by train from Kowloon to Canton (Guangzhou) through the border town of Sham Chun (Shenzhen). My first impression was that Communist China's trains travelled so smooth, unlike our own local trains. From Canton, we had flown to Shanghai, and from Shanghai we again boarded China's trains to visit Hangchow (Hangzhou) and Suchow (Suzhou). We then flew to Peking (Beijing) before flying back to Canton for the return trip by rail into Hongkong.

Then in 1982 when the Chess Olympiad was held in Luzerne, Switzerland, my team-mates took the super-efficient train rides between Kloten Airport and Lucerne, via Zurich. On one of the rest days for the Chess Olympiad, I arranged a visit to the mountain town of Engelberg. Apart from the snow on Mt Titlis, the highlight of this day excursion was the train ride up the Swiss Alps, passing by many picturesque Swiss villages and crossing the snow line at one point. The trains really ran like clockwork! Talking about Lucerne too, we also visited the Swiss Transport Museum there and needless to say, my biggest enjoyment was spent among the train exhibits, especially the St Gotthard railway model with its intricate set of miniature bridges, tunnels and signals.

Back home in Malaysia, I've started to take the trains more often again on my occasional visits to Kuala Lumpur. This started about four or five years back when I wanted to give myself another chance to savour a train ride at night. To my surprise, I found that so much had changed for Malaysian Railways. For one thing, the carriages are now all air-conditioned. The seats are numbered and there is no risk of not finding a place to sit. For importantly, the carriages were cleaner (though not the toilets which remained as yucky as ever, in my opinion), quieter and ran much smoother.

So that was the re-start of my new love affair with Malaysia's railway station. Since that first trip, I've used the Malaysian Railways service several times now, even experiencing travels in the first class carriages. In my opinion, rail travel is the way forward for me, especially as I now enjoy a 50 percent discount on the tickets as a senior citizen. The new railway station in Bukit Mertajam is hardly six kilometers from my house and I can reach the station within 15 minutes tops, unlike the Penang International Airport which is 32 kilometers away and which requires a one-hour journey. Plus, by train, I get straight to KL Sentral from where I can get connections to anywhere in the Klang Valley.

Presently, with the completion of the double tracking and the introduction of the electric train service (ETS) between Butterworth and Kuala Lumpur, a one-way train journey to KL Sentral takes hardly four hours to complete. That's only very slightly longer than preparations required for a flight but more importantly for me, shorter than driving down to Kuala Lumpur. Besides which, I don't get all stressed up having to concentrate on my driving on the highways, if I choose to drive. Let the train driver take the stress, not me!

August full moon

It has been a hazy few days behind us but tonight's full moon shone very brightly in a cloudless sky as Bersih4 participants settle down for the night in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia. All you guys are fantastic!

Marcus Langdon, local historian and author

Here we are at the George Town World Heritage Incoporated (GTWHI) office at the corner of Carnarvon Street and Acheen Street two days ago when we joined in the launch of Marcus Langdon's latest book, George Town's Historic Commercial & Civic Precincts.

This happens to be a most interesting book that is full of information - and pictures - on some of the old historical buildings in the heritage city. It also traced the early development of George Town where Beach Street was originally located next to the sea front before land reclamation set it back and Weld Quay ultimately became the new thoroughfare by the sea.

I first met Langdon about a year ago when we both attended my friend, Kee Thuan Chye's book reading in a house in Malay Street. At that time, I already new that Langdon was carrying out research work on Penang's early history and in fact, already had Penang: Fourth Presidency of India 1805-1830 - his first volume of four - already published.

I had asked him when his second volume would be coming out and he said that he was still trying to find a publisher. Hopefully, he said, by Christmas. But it never happened because of various reasons.

I told him what I thought about the book. How it was fascinating to uncover the small snippets of information on Penang Free School. But too bad, I said, that there was so little information on the school's early years. That must have stirred up something because Langdon suddenly told me that he was devoting one whole chapter in his second volume to the Penang Free School.

If he had thought that the matter would rest there and then, I think that he was surprised when several months later, I made an arrangement to meet him at The Old Frees' Association where we exchanged views about the founding of the school. He offered me a copy of his manuscript, the chapter on the school, on condition that it was not shown to anyone until his book was published. With Volume Two of Penang: Fourth Presidency of India 1805-1830 set to appear anytime soon, most probably within the next month, maybe I can just say enough that Old Frees everywhere should welcome this book's publication. You will not be disappointed with the contents, that I can guarantee you!

It's now minding your Os, Ps and Qs

When out of the blue, I received a message from my cousin, Eng Chye, inviting us down to a dinner in Petaling Jaya on the 10th of August, I decided that this was not going to be something that I would want to miss. For one thing, Eng Chye and I both go back a long way to 1974 when we got to know one another without realising that we are related. So we are very fast friends - and cousins. And for another thing, he was Best Man at our wedding. I could have called upon anyone in Penang to be Best Man but no, I plumbed for him although he was living in Petaling Jaya and he had agreed.

So there we were, at the D'Fong Restaurant in Petaling Jaya. We walked in to find four resplendent tables laid out for Eng Chye's and Adeline's family and relatives. Plus, there they were, the couple of the hour, Eng Chye's daughter, Xinyi, and her husband, who were being introduced round to us. Wow, like I told her, the last time that I saw her, it was at a restaurant at the Gurney Plaza and she was just this tall.

And there they were too, some more of my multitudes of Oh relatives amidst the Phuah relatives, many of whom I was meeting for the first time too. So pardon me if I'm unable to remember who's who and who's named what. They were really that many and my poor brain just couldn't function properly.

Oh yes, seeing everybody together like this, I would wish to update one saying that Eng Chye and I used to have a chuckle together in the past. Based on our surnames, we had been telling people to really "mind their Ps and Qs" with us. Perhaps now, I should also change this to "minding your O(h)s, P(huah)s and Q(uah)s," It's not often that three surnames can mix together as well as this!

A dinner with relatives

We have been pretty busy moving about and eating during the past few days. On Saturday, we attended the Ban Hin Lee Bank 80th anniversary reunion dinner at the Royal Bintang Hotel in George Town, Penang, where we met up with a lot of people from our banking days.

Then on Sunday morning, we took the Express Rakyat train down to Kuala Lumpur where yet another dinner function awaited us: an informal dinner gathering at the Restaurant Siu Siu at Robson Heights, Kuala Lumpur, with some of my Oh relatives in the Klang Valley.

Standing left to right: Evelyn Lim, Peggy Oh, Amy Oh, Aaron Oh, Girlie, Harry Oh, myself and Michelle. Seated next to Saw See is Amy's and Peggy's mother, the last of the Oh family one generation before us.

BHLBank's 80th anniversary reunion dinner

It was a pity that Ban Hin Lee Bank ceased in exist when it was taken over by Southern Bank in 2001. What was supposed to be a merger of two equal partners when Ban Hin Lee and Southern began talking to one another in the 1990s was dealt a mortal blow when Bank Negara Malaysia, in its infinite wisdom, declared Ban Hin Lee Bank to be the junior partner in the merger process. As a result, Ban Hin Lee lost out in everything and the bank ceased to exist as an entity after July 2001.

But the culture and philosophy of Ban Hin Lee Bank remained steadfastly ingrained in its ex-employees. Though they might have been absorbed into the enlarged Southern Bank entity or they left to pursue other careers elsewhere, the former BHLB employees carried with them the credo of everything that Ban Hin Lee stood for: maintaining excellent work ethics and high professionalism in whatever they do.

Above all, the former employees of BHLB never forgot how the staff had always gelled together as a team whether at work or at play. We had the Senior Management team to thank for this because they instilled in us the importance of team work which carried through to our recreational activities. For instance, I remember how the BHLB Recreation Club had constantly drawn up varied activities for us: organising outings or sports events that played a big role in bringing the staff together. By and large, we understood one another.

So even though BHLBank had ceased to exist for 14 years already, the good memories of having worked in this banking institution are still there. I am not alone in this. Throughout the country, we have countless other ex-BHLB staff who must obviously feel the same way too. Why I say this: just last Saturday (8 Aug 2015) we had 200 or so of the former Ban Hin Lee Bank staff come together for a reunion dinner to celebrate what would have been the bank's 80th anniversary, as though the bank was still around. 

[There would have been more significance if the organisers had chosen the 17th of September for this reunion because this date in 1935 was the date when Ban Hin Lee Bank sprang into life. But let's not quibble about this little detail, shall we?]

I've had people who were astounded two years ago when I told them that we still had reunions after 12 years. Last weekend in 2015, 14 years after 2001, we came together again. And this time, we attended the reunion with an even greater enthusiasm because of the good feelings of the 80th anniversary behind it. Unfortunately, those ex-staff who missed out on the event would have really missed out on a great opportunity to catch up with old friends first and former colleagues second. We were the greatest bunch of people that we had ever worked with, that's all I have to say.

The Ban Hin Lee Bank family

Choosing our door gifts at the Registration counter

Former BHLB CEO Dato' Seri Goh Eng Toon and former Assistant General Manager Tan Kuan Hai

Former General Manager Neoh Choo Kean

24,000 records

Saw this story on the BBC website: someone in England with a collection of 24,000 vinyl records of dance music from 1983 to 1993, bought second-hand from a former music industry executive. The whole collection probably weighs close to 4.8 kilotons (or 4,800 kilogrammes). P.S. My personal collection of about 700 records definitely pales by comparison.

Ooi Eow Jin, post-concert

I'm quite happy to note that the charity concert in Petaling Jaya yesterday (19 July 2015) to benefit Penang's forgotten music maestro Ooi Eow Jin got off to a wonderful start.

Although it was a concert by budding young local musicians playing classical pieces, it was standing room all round at the MK Joyworks recital hall. Originally meant for only a maximum of 250 seated people, more than 400 jammed into the hall subsequently. I'm sure the young performers were rather overwhelmed by the occasion, not expecting or prepared to play before such a large capacity crowd.

But the people had not come simply to listen to just the classical music. They were there to show their support for Ooi Eow Jin after his plight was highlighted earlier this month in my blog story. Uncle Ooi himself attended the concert together with his wife and he was introduced to the audience.

Sportingly, he even sat down at the piano to entertain the people with a medley of songs from his vast repertoire. “It was a privilege entertaining the masses for all these years. I used to play a lot of classical music, but now I prefer to play jazz,” he said. The picture here was taken from The Malaysian Insider which had covered this concert event for the online news portal.

Before the concert began, it was announced that RM42,700 had been collected for Ooi Eow Jin but there were still a bit more that had not been added into this figure. I was told that at first, the announcement did not register with him, presumably because of the noise in the hall and he also being a bit deaf, but later in a quieter moment when he learnt of the amount collected, his face turned incredulous.

UPDATE (24 July 2015): I've just been informed that post-concert, the total collected for Ooi Eow Jin's benefit has tallied up to RM74,000. Much of the cash donations were received from fellow Old Frees as well as members of the public. Unfortunately, the host and organizer of the concert in Petaling Jaya, Lai Mei Kuen, had herself suffered a mild stroke three days earlier and this caused quite some confusion to the arrangements at Eow Jin's event. According to Jimmy Yeoh, some guests who had bought tickets earlier but had come late found last-minute walk-in people having taken away their seats. Another problem was that some people were upset that they did not receive any acknowledgement for their contributions. Jimmy said that he would work with Ms Lai to help clear up this mess as soon as possible. 

If things go according to plan, we shall see two more concerts for Ooi Eow Jin later this year in August or September. One will be in Kuala Lumpur while the other will be in his hometown, Penang, but both will feature only his music. Perhaps some performers who have sung to his songs before will agree to appear for him. There is an indication that Datuk Johari Salleh, who used to lead the Radio Television Malaysia Orchestra, may be persuaded to take part too.

On my part, I've written to the Penang Chief Minister, Lim Guan Eng, to ask whether the state government can contribute the use of the Dewan Sri Pinang as the venue of the Penang concert, no less because the Chief Minister also happens to be the chairman of the Penang Free School Board of Trustees and we know that Uncle Ooi happened to be an Old Boy of the school. However, I have yet to receive a reply from anyone in the state government. Whether or not they can accede to my request is immaterial though. It is more important that they reply so that the organisers of the Penang concert can proceed with whatever alternate plans.

But first, OEJ and his wife will be in Penang later this week - a home-coming trip - for some personal matters, one of which I understand will be a visit to his elder son's grave. Their schedule is bound to be busy but I hope for an opportunity to meet up with this old couple and learn first-hand of their plight. I have played my part to make the public more aware of this forgotten music maestro in our midst and I hope other people can continue to help them more tangibly by contributing to the proper Ooi Eow Jin Trust Fund when it is set up later.

In the meantime, contributions can still be made to the unofficial OEJ Fund as displayed below. This account is for real but I would like to remind people that once you transfer any money to this account, please take a screenshot of the transaction, or print the details, and email the image to Jimmy Yeoh to inform him. This is IMPORTANT for matching purposes, while we await the setting up of the proper OEJ Trust Fund.

Galilean moons

Now that all the excitement over the conjunction between Jupiter and Venus in our evening skies is over, my attention is drawn to Jupiter itself. This is by far the biggest planet in our solar system but because of its immense distance from us, it appears rather small in our sight. And of course, it is far dimmer than the much brighter Venus.

I did notice both Jupiter and Venus last night because it happened to be a very clear night. Venus had already drawn a considerable distance away but still, there was no mistaking them. I turned my sights on Jupiter.

Already during the conjunction, I had noticed two tiny specks of light on opposite sides of Jupiter when I cropped the picture I took with the Olympus EPL-7 camera. Two tiny specks of light which I found out later were two of the four Galilean moons that were discovered by Galileo. But I had no opportunity of determining which was which because, frankly, I did not know.

Last night, I decided to mount the camera on a sturdy tripod and turned it towards the planet with the zoom lens pulled out to its biggest magnification: 150mm on the four-thirds camera. I took various exposures with this set-up, copied the images to the computer for some digital manipulation and this happened to be the clearest image among all those taken:

I was a bit flabbergasted. Oh, wow. For the first time, I saw four smudgy light sources, the four small Galilean satellites around Jupiter, two on separate sides of the great planet. Oh, wow, again! All that, taken with this little humble camera of mine. I must say: it's really incredible, the optics.

Helping out Ooi Eow Jin

I am actually very humbled that my original story on forgotten music maestro Ooi Eow Jin had generated so much interest in the country and rally around many people who would like to see OEJ under happier circumstances.

I would like to do more for OEJ but as I do not stay in Kuala Lumpur, I have to depend a lot on my contacts there to get information on the latest developments regarding his predicament.  For this, Jimmy Yeoh - an Old Free like myself and yes, Ooi Eow Jin himself - has been the forerunner of a movement to raise funds for the old couple and their son. I thank him for all the work done so far and the work that still has to be done in the months ahead.

One of the latest messages that Jimmy sent me mentioned that two days ago, he had visited Eow Jin and his family in their present humble abode. His message reads:

"SS and all our friends on your page, I had a great meeting with EJ and his wife though his son was not able to join us as his condition is rather bad. EJ's son has two tumours in his head (one in the front and one behind the head, and it would seem that a third has recently appeared, very worrying if I may say).

"Re the need for a bank account to receive contributions, EJ's wife has asked me to be the temporary recipient of all funds until a special account for the OEJ Fund can be arranged and completed. For that, I will be asking OFA KL/Selangor members to get a lawyer member of the alumni to do the necessary to register such an account after which money collected by me and Lai Mei Kuan can be then transferred to the official OEJ Fund account." 

Ms Lai Mew Kuen is, of course, organising the first concert for Ooi Eow Jin's benefit this coming 19th of July in Petaling Jaya. The details of Jimmy's temporary account to collect money is shown below. I would like to remind people that once you transfer any fund to this account, please take a screenshot of the transaction, or print the details, and email the image to Jimmy to inform him. This is IMPORTANT, while we await the setting up of a proper OEJ Fund soon.

Benefit concert to aid Ooi Eow Jin

Last month, Jimmy Yeoh, one of my facebook friends, wrote a long passage about a fellow Old Free, Ooi Eow Jin.

People my age may recognise this name instantly. Ooi Eow Jin is a local musician and composer. In his younger days, he was a band leader who led the Radio Television Malaysia (RTM) Orchestra for many years.

I've just found out that Eow Jin has finally retired from the local music scene. He is now 77 years old (born in 1938) at an age when most people would have taken life easy, but he had to keep working hard for a reason which I would like to share on my blog.

During his long career, Eow Jin had supported his two sons through their education until both graduated from University. Unfortunately, his second son died after a prolonged battle against leukemia despite his efforts to give his son the best treatment available. Eow Jin, himself showing signs of Alzheimer's disease, continued his career as a resident pianist at the Majestic Hotel in Kuala Lumpur until 30 June when he made his final bow.

I am told that his eldest son is now suffering from a brain tumour. Again, it was with the effort of Eow Jin that the son is still hanging on to life. Eow Jin now lives with his wife and son in a home shared with other unfortunate people.

Jimmy met with Eow Jin and another fellow Old Free, Richard Hoon, and they (Jimmy and Richard) agreed to do their best to help Eow Jin and his family to have a more comfortable life from now on. To achieve this, they proposed to organize at least three charity shows to raise money for Eow Jin. One of the shows is now coming to fruition. I received this appeal letter today with details of the first show which will be in Petaling Jaya:

I wish to call upon my friends, both Old Frees and non-Old Frees, to support this worthy programme to help this outstanding man in his difficult times. Even if you can't make it to the show, please consider donating some funds. Whatever you give, I'm sure you will receive back the blessings many times over. Thank you. The programme appears below:

Celestial wonder

Wonderful sight in the night sky during these past few days. Of course, I knew that it was the 15th day of the lunar month when the moon would be at its fullest glory, shining down brightly for all to see. But I did not expect to see the other wonder in the sky until the last day of June. By then, I had missed out on the opportunity of seeing Venus and Jupiter creeping ever slowly together for much of the month.

When I eventually saw the conjunction of the two planets, I called out to my wife to witness the occasion too. I explained to her that the brighter spot of light in the night sky was that of Venus while the fainter spot belonged to Jupiter.

"But isn't Jupiter a much bigger planet than Venus," she had commented, which was quite true. "Yes," I answered, "but Jupiter is so much more farther away. Among the planets which we can observe with the naked eye, Venus is the closest to Earth and should seem bigger than Jupiter."

"It is because of the conjunction, when both planets are lined up in the same sector of the sky, that we can compare their apparent brightness," I had added.

So there we were, facing westward outside the house, and staring in admiration at the two planets. Of course, I had to ready my camera to capture the amazing sight. Then we looked in the opposite direction and there we saw it: the rising full moon in the east. On the following night, I tried to photograph the planets again and I must say that I was more satisfied with my newer efforts. When I processed the images later, I was amazed to notice two of Jupiter's Galilean moons too, That was how bright the planet was shining.

A family of teachers

I've been seeing a number of my old school pals lately but this afternoon was quite something else. I went downtown to meet up with Chuan Keat and Leong Teik - the former having arrived from Kuala Lumpur yesterday and the latter zooming up from Singapore on the same day - and we then went to the E&O Hotel in Farquhar Street to visit our old school teacher, Tan Joo Sin, who is now a long-term resident at the hotel. Swee Poh was already there with her and from what I know, he is her very regular visitor whenever he's back from South Australia, sometimes visiting her two or three times a week.

Tan Joo Sin should be well in her 90s by now. Previously, she lived in a bungalow house in Barrack Road but when her sister passed away several years ago and unaided walking became a problem, she moved into the E&O Hotel with two foreign carers. I've no idea how much she must be spending on her accommodation in this five-star hotel but it must be costing her an arm and a leg.

Ms Tan was my teacher at the Penang Free School but unfortunately, my memory fails me whenever I try to recall the subject or subjects that she must have taught my classmates. Was it English? Or was it English literature? Or could it be Physical Geography? Mmm....

Anyway, I do remember that she was the teacher-in-charge of the Khutub Khanah Tunku, an absolutely indescribable name for the PFS Library that was opened in December 1969, and named after the country's first Prime Minister who happened to be an Old Boy of the school.

After my Higher School Certificate examinations in 1972, I regularly returned to the school to use the library. It held tons of interesting books, old books even, including a series of great classic novels such as Thomas Malory's Le Morte d'Arthur. I would walk the corridors, peering at the shelves and especially, rummaging through the foreign newspapers and magazines when I discovered, quite by accident, that magazines like The Spectator carried a chess column within its pages. I would disappear into a tiny room at the back of the building where the old magazines were stored. I had great fun reading all those magazines and book classics while free of any exam worries and before worries of the exam results set in.

Incidentally, Tan Joo Sin had a brother teaching in the Penang Free School. Capt Tan Boon Soon was the afternoon supervisor when I entered PFS in 1966, the position akin to being the afternoon "headmaster". Tan, himself an Old Boy of the school, was also captain of the school's Cadet Corps. He, together with three or four other teachers, would occasionally turn up for work dressed resplendently in white knee-length trousers while wearing shiny black boots with long white cotton socks pulled up and folded down below the kneecaps. A typical Old World gentleman.

For heritage, for charity

Over the course of the last two months, I have participated in two walkabouts around the heritage zone of George Town, all in the name of helping to raise funds for charity. In March, my wife and I took part in the three-kilometer D'Home charity walk while more recently, about a week ago, it was in a slightly longer five-kilometer FMM heritage green walk. On this latter occasion, I walked by myself as my wife was caught up with the organisation of this event.

Starting from the OCBC Bank, the route took us past several prominent landmark heritage sites in the city:

• the Peranakan Museum in Church Street, 
• the Sri Maha Mariamman Temple in Queen Street, 
• the Han Jiang Temple in Chulia Street, 
• the Kew Leong Tong Lim Temple in Ah Quee Street, 
• the Fire Brigade building in Beach Street, 
• the Seh Tek Tong Cheah Kongsi, the Poh Hock Seah and the Choo Chay Keong Yap Temple in Armenian Street, 
• the Leong San Tong Khoo Kongsi in Cannon Street, 
• the Malay Mosque in Acheen Street, 
• the Syed Al-Atas Mansion and the Sun Yat Sen Centre in Armenian Street, 
• the Kapitan Kling Mosque and the Kuan Imm Temple in Pitt Street, 
• the Thean Hou Kong Hainan Temple in Muntri Street, 
• the Cheong Fatt Tze Mansion in Leith Street, 
• the Protestant Cemetery in Northam Road, 
• the Farquhar Mansion, the Eastern & Oriental Hotel, the Garage, the St Xavier's Institution and the Cathedral of the Assumption in Farquhar Street, 
• the Convent Light Street, Supreme Court building, the Logan Memorial, Esplanade, the Chinese Chamber of Commerce building, the Foo Tye Sin Mansion, the Fort Cornwallis and the Cheah Chen Eok Clock Tower in Light Street, and
• the old Government Office, Standard Chartered Bank, Hongkong & Shanghai Bank Corporation, Logan's Building, the Whiteaways Arcade, India House and back to the Overseas Chinese Banking Corporation in Beach Street. 

Beach Street at five o'clock in the morning.

The same Beach Street at seven o'clock in the morning before the flag-off

The flag-off by Penang Chief Minster Lim Guan Eng and FMM Penang Branch chairman Dr Ooi Eng Hock 

Light spot of nasi lemak breakfast for Dr Ooi Eng Hock, Lim Guan Eng and OCBC Bank CEO Ong Eng Bin after the flag-off

Large crowd of participants walking down Church Street

Family fun, including this participant being pushed along the route

Volunteers from OCBC Bank helping out with the checking of the participants

Walk's over and it's time for some fun on the stage...

...and on the street, crowds join the lively zumba craze...

...including ExCo member Chow Kon Yeow, Ong Eng Bin, Dr Ooi Eng Hock and ExCo member Chong Eng

The Chief Minister's back and it's time to commence with the closing ceremony

But first, the obligatory speeches

The Penang Chief Minister's inspirational speech. I failed to record the beginning of his speech and only managed to capture the second half. But what a message he delivered to the people of Penang! Certainly worth a viewing or two.

The donors and representatives of the 10 charitable organisations, each receiving RM20,000

Such was the mood at the closing ceremony that even the OCBC Bank CEO was unable to resist a bit of fun

The organisers and main sponsors of the FMM heritage green walk with the Penang Chief Minister

A planned get-together and unplanned ones too

The last weekend has been pretty busy for me. On Friday evening, I was invited to a networking dinner at the OCBC Premier Banking Centre in Beach Street, George Town. And then on Saturday, it was the Board of Prefects 150th anniversary dinner at the Penang Free School hall.

Early Sunday morning saw me in Beach Street as I participated in the five kilometer-long FMM heritage green walk which mended its way through the heritage parts of the city, followed a few hours later with a closed lunch with old schoolmates at The Old Free's Association's tavern in Northam Road.

Needless to say, with all these activities - especially the strenuous walk on Sunday morning - I really enjoyed a good night's sleep and awoke refreshed this morning.

I wouldn't be writing about this if not for the fact that I met up with several old friends and former colleagues.

My closed door get-together with my old schoolmates. Here we are, relaxing at the OFA Tavern, after a round of lunch. Revelling in old gossip, naturally. Standing, left to right: Wong Chye Chye, Chin Chin Wah, myself, Andrew Choong and Wong Hang Yoke. Sitting, left to right: Lim Siang Jin, my wife, Lam Yoong Koy, Tan Leng Kooi and Ooi Kah Theang.

Amidst the 300-odd people that had crammed into the school hall at the Penang Free School, I was quite certain of bumping into some of old school friends. Which I did. Not many, though. Could count those present with the fingers on one hand. That was how many of my old school mates were present at the BOP 150th anniversary dinner. Wished there were more.

So here we were with, left to right, Abu Huraira bin Yazid, Cheah Swee Poh, Lim Siang Jin and myself. On the far right was our former mathematics teacher - he taught us additional maths in Forms Four and Five, and modern maths in Form Six - who later entered politics and was an Executive Councillor in Penang during the days of Lim Chong Eu's tenure as Penang's Chief Minister. At one point, Khor Gark Kim was briefly deputising for Chong Eu.

At the same dinner too, I bumped into a handful of former colleagues from my Ban Hin Lee Bank days. We got around for a photograph but unfortunately later, I discovered that there were two other ex-BHLBank friends in the hall. Abdul Aziz Sulaiman was actually seen seated here when we took this photograph. Nuts, if I had realised it, I would have asked him to join in. The other ex-BHLBank colleague was Yusri Hamid but he was a distance away. I did try to get another group picture later but with people already starting to drift off after the dinner ended, my hopes of a second photograph ended too. Anyway, seen here, left to right, were Ng Khye Wai, myself, Chew Kah Hooi and Zakaria Merican.

And finally, there were these five of us at the OCBC premier banking centre. Alex Tan Cheng Keat, Ng Ji Li and Cheryl Deborah de Souza are now staff of OCBC Bank in Beach Street but before then, they were staff of the now defunct Ban Hin Lee Bank, just like myself and Saw See.

Alex started his banking career as a teller at Pulau Tikus Branch of Ban Hin Lee Bank. About six months, he said. There were countless hours spent sorting and counting bank notes. I asked him, "Really? You were at PT Branch? Would you remember the address of the branch?" He could not. "Well, it's 403," I reminded him. I should know very well; I was among the pioneer staff when the branch opened in December 1977.

Ju Li said that she was working in the same branch too before moving to the Corporate Loans Division later, while Cheryl said that she worked at the Komtar Branch for several years. Regaling in past memories, Cheryl said that she really looked forward to going to work every day while at BHLB. Her days at Komtar Branch actually molded her work ethics and culture. She reported to Wong Kim Meng and he was absolutely very strict with the staff and brooked no nonsense. If anyone were to so much as to draw a crooked line in the registers, he would simply throw the registers back at the offending staff.

Private dinner at OFA Restaurant

Quite an enjoyable and interesting experience I had last night when I was invited to join a private dinner with friends and acquaintances at the OFA Restaurant in Penang. Dinner was hosted by Anwar Fazal whom I know personally in several capacities such as he being the president of the Dr Wu Lien-Teh Society and the chairman of Think City Sdn Bhd.

His main guests at dinner were Mary Hughes and her husband. Both had been in Malaysia for about four weeks already, and they had been travelling around the peninsula on sort of a homecoming trip. Mary is the daughter of JMB Hughes who was the last British headmaster of the Penang Free School and had lived in the old Headmaster's Bungalow on the school grounds from 1957 until 1963. In fact, she was born in Kota Bharu when Hughes worked there prior to his transfer back to Penang. "I came home," was how she described her trip to Malaysia.

JC Rajarao arrived from Kuala Lumpur yesterday. Rao was another Old Boy of the school and he was also a teacher in his Alma Mater. Lately, I have been corresponding with him as I wanted to tap his memory for information about the Indian National Army (INA). I had known that during the period of the Japanese Occupation from 1941 to 1945, he had a brief stint in the youth section of the INA. Certainly, he had a very colourful past.

Nik Rahiman was another guest at dinner. He is an architect by profession and presently, his firm is undertaking some restoration work for the Penang State Museum in Farquhar Street. That building used to be the former premises of the Penang Free School and later, the Hutchings School. At the tail-end of the Japanese Occupation, half of the original building was destroyed by Allied bombing.

He was telling us that the Chief Minister, Lim Guan Eng, was informed that it could cost about RM7 million if the state government wanted to rebuild the bombed half of the school. The story goes that the CM shelved the idea when he heard of the cost involved.

Nik Rahiman isn't an Old Free but his partner in the architect firm is. A by-product of their state museum restoration work is that they have documented the architectural features of the present school building in Green Lane too. They have more or less finished with that task and they plan to publish the results anytime.

Finally, we had Khoo Salma and her husband, Abdur-razak Lubis. Khoo Salma needs no introduction at all as she is the president of the Penang Heritage Trust. I've known her for a very long time partly because she is cousin to Eric Cheah, a long-time chess friend in Penang. Moreover, her ties with the Free School comes from her father being both an Old Boy and teacher at the school.

And so at dinner, it was a foregone conclusion that the topics of discussion would revolve around the Penang Free School and heritage issues in Penang. Personally, I found the discussions quite informative but it is not appropriate for me to say anything here.

Bullock cart express, part 2

In June 2013, I had written something about the bullock cart express. Yes, that's right, I'm was referring to the Malaysian postal services. Nothing has changed in the intervening two years. We still get the same bullock cart treatment from the same service provider, namely, Pos Malaysia.

Only this time, my experience is with posting out a letter to Singapore, not receiving one. Here is what happened.

When I returned from Singapore earlier this month, I had to send back to my old school pal there something that belonged to him. So I went to the post office in Bukit Mertajam on the morning of 12th May with my letter. The lady at the counter issued me with the stamp and even gummed an airmail sticker to the envelope without me asking for it. Destination: Singapore. By airmail. How slow could it take to arrive at its destination?

I just found out. My pal in Singapore received my letter yesterday. That's the 22nd of May. Eleven whole days for a letter to travel from Bukit Mertajam to Singapore by airmail. Wow, talk about efficiency from the Malaysian postal service!

Just to place matters in its proper perspective, let me add that the letter was dropped into the post box inside the Bukit Mertajam post office before noon on 12th May -- that's well before their daily cut-off time of 1p.m. -- and the letter bore a Butterworth post mark dated 14th May. Imagine, it already took the postal services TWO DAYS for the letter to travel from Bukit Mertajam to Butterworth. I guess the poor postman must have walked the 11 kilometers from one post office to the other.

And then there are the remaining nine days for the letter to move from the Butterworth post office to my friend. Who is at fault: Singapore Post or Pos Malaysia? How long does Singapore Post take to deliver mail within their borders? And how long does it take Pos Malaysia to ensure that an airmailed letter would travel from Penang to Singapore?

Eleven whole days for delivery. Excuse me, there are scores of flights everyday between Malaysia and Singapore. Did my letter actually travel by air from Penang to Kuala Lumpur and from Kuala Lumpur to Singapore? Or did it travel by air directly from Penang to Singapore? Or, did the postal services simply ignore their own airmail sticker and send my letter over surface mail, meaning, overland? I dread to think that if it had taken so long for an airmail delivery, how much longer it would take if their counter staff had not affixed that sticker on the envelope.

Do Singapore Post and Pos Malaysia have a KPI for their delivery processes? Definitely, I am owed an explanation. There are just too many occurrences of inefficiencies in the delivery system.

Remembering William B Kelley

I first got to know William B Kelley more than 20 years ago when he came to visit Penang with his close companion, Chen Ooi, who happens to be my god-uncle.

You see, we Chinese have this time-honoured tradition where good family friends like to accept one another as close relations. So it was in the mid-1950s that my paternal grandparents took care of the son of one of their family friends and eventually, accepted him as their god-son, which made me a god-nephew to this fellow. He was just two years older than I, and we got along quite well. We played together whenever we got the chance. After Form Five, he suddenly decided to seek his fortune in the United States where he settled down later in Chicago with William Kelley whom he got to know over there.

I think it was in the mid-1990s when my family was still living in Seberang Jaya that my god-uncle and William Kelley - whom my son and daughter would call Uncle Bill - came to visit Penang. It was the first time that I had ever met Bill, a distinguished man about 10 years older than Chen Ooi.

Their second trip to Penang was more sober. Chen Ooi's mother had passed away and they came for the funeral. And their third trip was several years later when my god-uncle wanted to visit the columbarium and temple, and pay his respects to his mom. I would take them on a tour of the island, visiting places like the Kek Lok Si temple, the Ayer Itam dam, the Khoo Kongsi, Butterfly Farm, etc. These three visits of theirs and our numerous email exchanges brought me to understand Bill and his work better. Definitely, knowing Bill helped to broaden my outlook of life.

For you see, Bill was a human rights activist in the United States. But he was not just any common human rights activist; Bill was more special. He was an LGBT rights activist. Almost throughout his whole adult life, he breathed and worked to promote LGBT rights. Unfortunately, my friend Bill passed away in his sleep at home in Chicago on Sunday, 17 May 2015, and today is his funeral.

Bill was born in Missouri but he moved to attend the University of Chicago in 1959. By 1965, he was a member of the Chicago branch of the Mattachine Society, an early gay organization, founded in 1950.

In 1966, he helped organise the North American Conference of Homophile Organizations and helped found the Chicago Gay Crusader newspaper.

In 1967, along with some of the great names in American LGBT history, he picketed Independence Hall in defense of equality of rights before the law for gay people.

In 1977, Bill was one of the representatives of the LGBT community to have met with President Carter at the White House.

In the last few years, he had witnessed many landmark decisions to overturn anti-gay legislation in the United States. When Bill first moved to Illinois, it was illegal to be gay in all of America's 50 states. By his death it was legal for gay couples to marry, and Bill was instrumental in this battle.

My memories of Bill would include him visiting my home for the very first time and calling my aunt (and Chen Ooi's god-sister) Busu-chi or Sister Busu. Also, in February 2013, I had arranged a Skype hook-up with Chen Ooi and Bill in Chicago so that they could talk with my aunt who was already in great pain and in the last few months of her life.

Also, I remember Bill as a very well-read man who was very proud of his family lineage. While I could trace my own ancestors in Malaysia back to my great-great-grandfather, Bill could count on ancestors that fought in the American Civil War.

Healthwise, I knew that Bill had suffered from a heart attack maybe about eight years or so ago. Thankfully, he had recovered sufficiently to carry on with his life's work for the LGBT community in the United States. But anyone with a similar health history as him would certainly realise that every new day would be a bonus. Bill knew that of course, because he told me:

"I'm recovering well from my heart attack, though I occasionally still get a little short of breath. Apparently the heart damage, though considerable, wasn't as much as the cardiologist thought at first. I never took care of my health before, except that I ate fairly well, and have been fortunate in usually having good health. There's not too much I can do now that the damage is done, except try harder to eat well and (ugh!) exercise, take my medicines (now down to a few more than half a dozen a day), try not to waste time, and consider it a signal that I probably won't live many more years, given my cardiac heredity and the fact that I've already had an attack."

Apart from his activist work, it may be unnecessary for me to add that Bill loved music and concerts, good food and travelling. In addition, I could sense that he loved nature deeply. In the last month of his life, I had noticed that he was more appreciative of the natural beauty that surrounded their house in Chicago.

Rest in peace, Bill, rest in peace. Your work is done.