Fatherless, to Father, Grandfather Now: "A Son's Search for His Roots....The Yong Peng Pow & Chong Ngow Family"

By Ir Yong Poh Kah

The Author seeks to trace his roots from the time the grandfather, Yong Koon (Seong) (born in 1871, China ; came to British Malaya in 1885 to join his two brothers to work as tinsmiths in Kuala Lumpur, Yong Koon went back to China to seek a wife ; married Loh Pat but left when she was with child in 1905. In 1911, he went to China to bring back his wife and first born son, Peng Pow , the father of the author. Another three sons were born, Peng Sin (1914), Peng Kai (1915) and Peng Seong (1923). Initially Yong Koon and his family, stayed with his brothers and families at their shop at Cross Street, Kuala Lumpur. Later, the grandmother , a shrewd and frugal n businesslady; saved enough to buy a 2 storey shop house at 219 Pudu Road which the whole family moved to. Peng Pow was a good student who studied in MBSKL in the early years but tranferred to Kajang High School where he sat for his Junior Cambridge Exams in 1922. Basing on his good scores; he and another classmate, Justice Tan Sri Datok Yong Shi Meow was asked by the school to sit for the Queen's Scholarship exams in 1924. Both were successful and offered scholarships to study in the United Kingdoom but they had to buy their own steamboat tickets to UK. Unfortunately, PP's parents refused to give him the money for the ticket as they expected him , being the first born son and out of filiality ; should stay behind to look after the parents and his 3 younger brothers. Instead the parents gave him money to start an English language bookstore in a small room at the corner pawnshop along Yap Ah Loy street. Phoenix Bookstore catered mainly for English businessmen, planters and returning soldiers serving in British Malaya then. By accident, an English businessman; aware that PP's father and uncles were tinsmiths, suggested that he should experiment with the manufacture of pewter ware such as beer mugs, cigarette cases, candle holders, vases ect. for export to England and Europe where these were in demand and expensive. After successfully producing some prototypes samples,;orders poured in and Malayan Pewter Works which PP started; moved to 219.By then, PP already married to his child bride (bought into the Yong family in 1917) had 4 older children (Woon Yin, Poh Seong, Siew Yin and Poh Fah). With the assitance of the 3 younger brothers; business picked up and PP even paid for the weddings of the two older ones. However; sometime in 1935; PP took a second wife and in 1939 told the father and brothers that he was moving away to a bigger premise at 4th Mile Cheras Road as his family was increasing and business expanding . After a heated argument with his father and brothers (Loh Pat already dead); PP and his two wives and 12 children, were asked to vacate the patriach home of Yong Koon , just after the fullmoon of the author. Not long after; Japan attacked Malaya on 10 Dec. 1941 and occupied Malaya and Singpore on 15 February 1942. Tragically, PP was murdered just 6 months or so before Japan surrendered after the dropping of the two atomic bombs on Horoshima and Nagasaki on 6 th and 8th August 1945. The author's mother , a widow with nine fatherless children; was totally devasted, penniless, disdraught and through sheer endurance, tremendous hardships, sacrifices and deprivations; finally saw her second last child (the author) graduate as an engineer in 1966 supported by scholarships in school and university.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Partridge Publishing Singapore
• Release date: Apr 8, 2013
• ISBN: 9781466934559

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Fatherless,

to Father,

Grandfather now

"A son's search for his Roots….

the Yong Peng Pow & Chong Ngow Family"

IR YONG POH KAH

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© Copyright 2013 Ir Yong Poh Kah.

All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise, without the written prior permission of the author.

ISBN: 978-1-4669-3453-5 (sc)

ISBN: 978-1-4669-3454-2 (hc)

ISBN: 978-1-4669-3455-9 (e)

Trafford rev. 03/21/2013

TFSG-logo_BWFC.psd www.traffordpublishing.com.sg

Singapore

toll-free: 800 101 2656 (Singapore)

Fax: [phone] (Singapore)

Dedicated to a loving and devoted Mother (Chong Ngow);

my supportive wife, Lai Fong and children,

Karen and Dennis

CONTENTS

PROLOGUE

ACKNOWLEDGEMENT

1.0 ROOTS: THE BEGINNING

1.1 ROOTS: YONG PENG POW

1.2 ROOTS OF YONG KOON (1871-1952)

1.3 ROOTS: MADAM CHONG NGOW

2.0 MOVE TO 4TH MILE, CHERAS ROAD

3.0 JAPAN ATTACKS BRITISH MALAYA

3.1 JAPANESE OCCUPATION

4.0 THE RETURN OF THE BRITISH

5.0 THE RETURN OF THE BRITISH—EMERGENCY RULE

6.0 LIFE WITHOUT A FATHER— POST WAR

7.0 MY EARLY SCHOOL DAYS (1948 TO 1959)

8.0 FOND MEMORIES OF SCHOOL DAYS

9.0 HAPPIEST MOMENTS AND MEMORIES—1949-1955

10.0 TERTIARY EDUCATION

11.0 RESPECTED LECTURERS

11.1 OUTSTANDING FELLOW STUDENTS

12.1 WORKING EXPERIENCE AFTER GRADUATION

12.2 COURTSHIP AND MARRIAGE: MAY 1967-JAN 1969

12.3 JOINING PKNS— AUGUST 1971 TO JANUARY 1975

13.0 COMMUNAL RIOTS: MAY 13, 1969

13.1 MAJOR FLOODS IN KUALA LUMPUR-28 DEC.1970

14.0 JOINING THE PRIVATE SECTOR

15.0 RECCESSION HITS MALAYSIA, SINGAPORE

16.0 MIGRATION TO AUSTRALIA

17.0 A MIGRANT RETURNS AS AN EXPATRIATE

18.0 BORED PILES FOUNDATIONS & RETAINING WALLS

19.0 IN HOUSE CONSULTANT

20.0 MOVING BACK TO MELBOURNE

21.0 BECOMING A FATHER-IN-LAW (MAY 2004)

22.0 LIFE IN RETIREMENT

23.0 BECOMING A GRANDFATHER

24.0 A NEAR TRAGEDY - Lai Fong taken ill

24.1 A SLOW BUT STEADY RECOVERY

25.0 GRAND PARENTS AGAIN

26.0 LESSONS FROM MY EXPERIENCE IN LIFE

27.0 EPILOGUE

28.0 FOOTNOTES

CHRONOLOGY OF EVENTS

INDEX

SELECTED REFERENCES

SYNOPSIS

PROLOGUE

The idea of writing up the roots and history of the family of Yong Peng Pow and Madam Chong Ngow never enter my mind seriously until I attended my eldest brother’s (Poh Seong’s)* 80th birthday dinner in June 2010 in Kuala Lumpur. His children; Melina, Rachel and Winston, had produced a booklet entitled The Life of A Photographer—Yong Poh Seong which was richly illustrated by photographs of Poh Seong from his early days to his recent retirement. At the dinner, I met up with my surviving siblings, their families, my first cousins from Royal Selangor Pewter and close friends of Poh Seong. Being the eighth child of our father, Peng Pow and mother, Chong Ngow; I was then turning 71 and my eldest Sister, Woon Yin was 81.**

I began seriously putting my idea of writing a brief history of our Yong Family into action in May 2012 after the near fatal illnesses of my wife; Lai Fong in October 2010. This traumatic incident was a wake up call to me that life is truly fragile and uncertain; one day we are fine and the next we are gone. It was also a catalyst to put on record the lives of our parents before my number is up. By emails and phone calls from Melbourne, Victoria; I started to contact all my older siblings and their children for photographs, documents, evidence and their recollections of certain events or incidents that occurred 7 decades ago especially those before I was born. Unfortunately nearly all my older siblings are hard of hearing and totally internet illiterate. As such I have to depend on their children to interview their parent (s) for the information in the various questionnaires that I emailed and my pleas for old photos, documents and their recollections. I even resorted to writing by long hand air letters to my eldest brother, Poh Seong but apparently these were lost in the mail in Malaysia! It was truly a long and exhaustive process as my nieces and nephews were busy working for a living and have little spare time to sit down with their parents and obtain all the answers to my questions and requests. Fortunately, my second sister (Siew Yin) was in Melbourne, having migrated with her son, Jee Ten*** and his family in November 2009. SY (now 80 years) is relatively in good health except for her back and leg pains but her memory and mind are still very clear as she still can remember vividly most of the events over 70 years back! I visited her several times and spent hours interviewing her and was fortunate to compile a fairly clear picture of the early days of our parents; the hardships, sufferings, sacrifices and poverty endured by our widowed mother and the nine fatherless children after our father, Peng Pow was kidnapped and killed in early 1945. On my side, I wrote to the various schools, Cambridge Examination Archives in England for copies of the Junior/Senior Cambridge Certificate of my father who studied in Kajang High School and sat for the exam in 1922. I also surfed the various websites of Google, Yahoo daily to obtain useful information on various subjects, events, personalities, schools, universities and incidents relevant to my book. After 6 months of sieving through the information supplied my siblings; Woon Yin, Poh Seong and Siew Yin, I hope I am able to put together a coherent story of our Yong Family.

ACKNOWLEDGEMENT

This book is researched and written after going through documents, photographs and evidence (written and oral) which were provided generously by all my siblings, nephews and nieces without which, this would not be possible. I also like to thank Royal Selangor Pewter for supplying me the various photographs of our grandfather, Yong Koon (Seong) and his sons and those of the shops at Cross Street and 219 Pudu Road, Kuala Lumpur.

The main purpose of my writing this book is to put on record for the present and future generations of the Yong Peng Pow Family; the true but tragic story of a once wealthy family suddenly reduced to abject poverty when the main bread earner was murdered and buried in a grave still unknown.

The story begins with the birth of the eighth member of the first Family at the start of WWII; the forceful ejection of the Family from the Patriarch Home at Pudu Road; the murder and the terrible trials of hardships, suffering and sacrifices that never seem to end. It is also a tribute to the most loving, devoted, caring and generous mother, who held her 9 fatherless children together despite pleas to separate them for adoptions. It is an honour and great tribute to my mother that I was the first in my generation to graduate from a University unsupported by the family but by scholarships.

I am also grateful to my wife, Lai Fong for proof reading the manuscript and my son, Dennis for sparing the time to assist me in formatting and retrieving the misplaced files off and on whenever I pressed the wrong keys.

image003.png

Map 1: Map of Shantau (Swatow), Guangdong, China****

Map_PeninsularMalaysia.png

Map 2: Map of British Peninsula Malaya in 1957*****

1.0

ROOTS: The Beginning

I was born actually on the first day when World War II started in Europe,(when Germany invaded Poland) i.e. on (1st September 1939). However, due to my dad’s procrastination in registering my birth; my official date of birth was 24 September 1939.

My father, Yong Peng Pow was the first born son of Yong Koon (Seong) and Loh Pat. He had 3 younger brothers; Peng Sin, Peng Kai and Peng Seong.

When I first came to this world at 9.15 pm that day; my mother later related that the mid wife, who delivered me shaking her head said that it would be a miracle if I would survive as I was born premature and grossly underweight i.e, half the weight of a normal baby less than 3 lbs. Mom used to relate that relatives visiting us, kept asking where I was as I was so tiny that the little Chinese pillow on the bed completely hid me! There were no hospitals or medical facilities to treat such premature and delicate babies in those days and the majority of them never survived beyond the first week of their birth.

I was the eighth child of a family of nine, the eldest was my sister, Woon Yin born in 1929; followed by my eldest brother, Poh Seong born 1930; then another sister, Siew Yin (1932); my second brother, Poh Fah (1934); third sister Chew Yin (1935); third brother, Poh Mee (1936); fourth sister, Shook Yin (1938). A younger brother, Poh Chuan was born during the Japanese war in 1941. (see Fig. 1: The Yong Koon Family Tree on page 2)

final%20family%20tree.pdf

1.1

ROOTS: YONG PENG POW

(see photo page 9)

Peng Pow’s Family Tree is as shown in Figure 1 on page 2. For purposes of my story; I shall concentrate only on the descendants and their families through the bloodline of Yong Peng Pow and Chong Ngow without too much mention of the families of Peng Pow’s three other younger brothers; Peng Sin, Peng Kai & Peng Seong except in passing. Yong Peng Pow was born in China when his father, Yong Koon married Pat Loh in 1904 on his return to China. Father and son never set eyes on each other until 1911 when Yong Koon returned to bring mother and son to British Malaya. It was recorded that Peng Pow registered to study the first few years at the Methodist Boys’ School, Jalan Horley, Kuala Lumpur. For some reasons unknown; his form teacher seemed to have taken an interest in him and with the permission of his parents; took him to Kajang High School in Kajang, 16 odd miles from Kuala Lumpur. He stayed and studied up to Junior Cambridge (Std Eight) and took this exam in 1922. Apparently his results was good enough to convince his teachers to recommend him to sit for the special exam to qualify for the Queen Scholarships to study in United Kingdom with full fees and boarding fully paid. However, the successful candidate need to pay for his own steam passage to England. Later my mother and brother confirmed that Peng Pow took the qualifying exam for the Scholarships in probably 1924. When the results of the exams came out; Peng Pow did well enough to be offered a place to study medicine in Britain but he had to pay his own passage there. Hopefully, he approached the parents for money to buy the steamship ticket but to his great disappointment, they refused. The parents told him that being the eldest and heir to the Yong Koon bloodline; he must stay behind and take care of his younger brothers and their families.

My inauspicious entry into the cruel world did not end there for just after my full moon (one Chinese month after birth); my father and his whole family (including the new born);was asked to leave the Patriarch Home of my grandfather, Yong Koon at 219 Jalan Pudu, Kuala Lumpur where all the families of all the 4 sons lived under the same roof. Later I was told that on that fateful day; Dad and his 3 younger brothers; namely Peng Sin, Peng Kai and Peng Seong; had a heated argument when he told them that he was moving to his own house cum workshop at 4th Mile Cheras Road, Kuala Lumpur as he found the present premises too congested with increasing children each year. Dad’s younger brothers who assisted him since school days with Dad supporting them and their families from young; felt abandoned and neglected by his leaving the Patriarch Home. To express their strong views, they sought the support of Yong Koon, their father who was convinced to throw in his support. In the heat of the argument; Grandpa lost his temper and shouted to Dad to leave immediately that day. Thus in the most humiliating and disgraceful manner; the sole bread earner of the Yong Koon Family was forcefully thrown out by the Patriarch and his three younger siblings! Later, mom told me that someone fired some very loud fire crackers behind us, giving the impression that our leaving was a cause for celebration as during the Chinese New Year! Mom said I wad suddenly woken up by the extremely sudden and loud noise. She sometimes wondered whether the permanent deafness in my left ear was caused by this. Our new timber plank house cum workshop was a single storey building with galvanized roofs; was situated at 4th Mile, Cheras Road, Kuala Lumpur just after the railway crossing and the river, Sungai Kerayong. The land was so low that during the heavy rainstorms; water overflowed from the river causing flooding in our house cum workshop up to the adult’s knees.

1.2

ROOTS OF YONG KOON

(1871-1952)

******

My grandfather, Yong Koon (Seong) was born in Dabu, Shantou (Swatow), China on 1871. He was apprenticed in the tinsmith industry, making weighing scales, every day items like pails, ceremonial items like joss sticks holders. In 1885 at the age of 14; he sailed to Malaya to join his eldest brother, Chin Seong and a younger brother, Wai Seong who had already been well established tin smiths in Kuala Lumpur. The brothers lived and worked in one of the 2 storey shop houses located at No. 23, Cross Street, known as today as Jalan Silang. The shop was known as Ngeok Foh in Hakka or Yu He in Mandarin Pinyin, meaning Jade Peace. Initially, the brothers being tinsmiths by trade; made a variety of simple household items for the fast growing population such as pails, gutters from galvanized steel as well as weighing scales used by merchants. Soon they ventured