Lost Childhood

By Melina Keel

This book chronicles journey and struggles of Melina Keel (Birth name Seah Pee Hong) from her difficult and impoverished childhood in Singapore to her successful and rewarding life as a wife, mother, grandmother and medical professional in the United States. It was written as a legacy for her family and friends and especially for her grandchildren who were still very young at the time of her passing.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Xlibris US
• Release date: Sep 1, 2018
• ISBN: 9781984550545

Melina Keel

Melina Keel (birth name: Seah Pee Hong) was born and raised in Singapore to parents who immigrated to Singapore from China. She endured a difficult and impoverished childhood that formed in her two overriding imperatives; 1) to help her mother who she deeply loved and respected and 2) to create a better life for herself and escape the cycle of poverty and abuse that defined her childhood. To these ends, Melina left school at an early age and worked hard at several different jobs in Singapore to help support her mother and family. During this time she refused multiple attempts by her mother to arrange marriages for her. At the age of 22, Melina left Singapore to live and work overseas while continuing to provide financial support for her mother and family. After living and working in several different countries Melina immigrated to the United States where she married, raised a family, completed her education and had a distinguished and rewarding career as an emergency nurse practitioner. In 2014, Melina was diagnosed with stage IV lung cancer. She loved her work and continued to work for as long as she could while receiving treatments for her disease. Melina lived the remainder of her life with her husband of thirty-four years, Jim, in their coastal retirement home in Aransas Pass, Texas.

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Copyright © 2018 by Melina Keel.

Library of Congress Control Number:           2018910314

ISBN:                 Hardcover                 978-1-9845-5056-9

                            Softcover                   978-1-9845-5055-2

                            eBook                        978-1-9845-5054-5

All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, or by any information storage and retrieval system, without permission in writing from the copyright owner.

Any people depicted in stock imagery provided by Getty Images are models, and such images are being used for illustrative purposes only.

Certain stock imagery © Getty Images.

Rev. date: 08/31/2018

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CONTENTS

Prologue

A Promise

110A Kim Keat Avenue, Singapore

Mary And Paul Tang

Promise Fulfilled

Two-Year Contract With Offshore International Inc

Houston, Texas

Chiba, Japan

Epilogue

Memories

PROLOGUE

I F LIFE IS a pilgrimage, death is an arrival ( Daily Prayer Book , from the burial service). Nothing is more certain than death. For some people, death comes suddenly, not leaving them any opportunity to reflect and tell their story. For others, they believe that they lead a boring life and that they do have not much to say or share. I believe even the deaf, the dumb, and the mute have a story to tell. I had always wanted to write a memoir when I retired; however, I had to put thoughts on the computer sooner than expected due to my diagnosis of stage IV lung cancer on September 25, 2014. According to Abraham Lincoln, It is not the years in your life you live, it is the life in the years you have lived.

Life’s ultimate meaning remains obscure unless it is reflected upon in the face of death (Rabbi Abraham Joshua Heschel). At the end of life, what really matters is what we shared. According to Ernest Hemingway, Every man’s life ends the same way. It is only the details of how he lived and how he died that distinguished one man from another. There will always be a reason why you meet people. You will either change their life or your life needs changing. Also, in life, do not expect anything from anyone. Expectations, when not fulfilled, cause disappointment, pain, and sufferings. Giving and sharing without any expectation will bring invaluable pleasure and satisfaction.

My greatest gifts were to my mother and perhaps to a few other people along the way. Despite our frequent heated arguments mixed with tears and resentment, there was always a special love and bond that Mother and I shared. This special bond was evident when Mother’s spirit traveled more than ten thousand miles from Singapore to Houston to bid me goodbye about two hours before her passing. I left home when I was twenty-two years old with the promise that Mother would never have to worry about money and that she would be comfortable for as long as I was capable of providing for her. I fulfilled that promise with so much love, passion, pleasure, and selflessness, knowing that it made Mother very happy. Regretfully, my selfishness and desire to seek adventures and to find out where I belonged separated Mother and me from 1975 till she passed in July of 1996. The handful of visits home were always a luxury and filled with pleasure and memories, but it was also a reminder of why I took a chance on the unknown and decided not to stay in Singapore, locked in the past, thinking of what could have been.

After all, life is not a product of my circumstances but a product of my decisions. My success is not measured by wealth or monetary value but rather with a gift that I am constantly seeking to better myself and the ability to listen and make people feel special. According to Maya Angelou, People will forget what you said, people will forget what you did, but people will never forget how you made them feel.

My accomplishments pale in comparison to that of scientists, corporate executive officers, successful entrepreneurs, the brave soldiers who fought selflessly for their country, and many more; but my story is written in the hope that it will inspire some people, even if it’s just a handful.

This memoir is written for my two wonderful children, Nicole and Ryan, and for my lovely grandchildren, Makenna, Callie, Collins, and Beckett, with the desire to let them know a little more about their mother and grandmother by opening a little window into snippets of my lost childhood time and struggles to become the person I am today. This memoir is also written in the hope that my children will understand the reason why I am constantly preaching the importance of hard work, selflessness, and always reaching for the stars regardless of obstacles. My willingness to explore, dream, and discover led me to be wise, organized, understanding of people and life in general, and forgiving. Most important of all, I wanted my children and grandchildren to have faith, believe in their goodness and strength, and allow God to constantly guide them in their journey called life.

To my grandchildren, I may not be around to live, laugh, and love along with each of you in your life’s journey. I hope this memoir will be a constant reminder to always love, respect your parents, and most of all, follow your heart and always know that there is a higher being guiding and watching you all if you take the time to stop, listen, and search.

This memoir is also intended to leave a legacy that does not have a dollar sign in front of it, and I also hope to impact my siblings, nephews, nieces, great-grandnephews and nieces in Singapore, people who I have met, crossed paths with, befriended, and people who matter in a positive way before my exit.

A PROMISE

Y OU CANNOT BE pregnant again! I cried. The world seemed to have crumbled around me; I was hyperventilating, sobbing uncontrollably, and feeling hopeless, disgusted, and angry at my mother, who stood helplessly opposite me in our small kitchen. How could you do this? We are already so poor and struggling each day. We cannot afford to have another mouth to feed. Unable to contain myself, I left the house and headed for the bus stop. It was around 2:00 p . m. on a Saturday afternoon. I mounted the bus, sat at the left end corner of the bus as usual, and looked out of the window, wondering how a thirteen-year-old could continue to handle so much hardship, pain, sorrow, and hopelessness. It was a habit that I acquired for a couple of years. Whenever I needed to escape, I would ride the bus around a familiar route for two to three hours to collect my thoughts and clear my mind.

That day, thoughts of suicide occupied my mind most of the time. Plans of hanging myself, jumping off the roof of a tall building, or standing in front of a train preoccupied my mind. They were very tempting thoughts. However, after several hours of churning thoughts and plans in between sobs, I realized that there was no way out. I thought to myself, Who is going to take care of my four younger siblings apart from my older sister and an older brother? Who is going to do the daily household chores and fold grocery bags at home, to bring in about fifty dollars a week? But most of all, who is going to watch, help, and take care of my mother, who labored day and night to raise her children and protect them from my abusive alcoholic father who also loves gambling?

The bus conductor eyed me suspiciously each time I paid twenty-five cents to repeat the same route. The bus went three times around the same familiar route while I collected myself, thinking things through and asking the same nagging questions over and over: What is the purpose of life? Why am I here, and how much pain and suffering do I have to endure? The pain in my heart was so wrenching, it hurt. It was about 5:00 p.m. when I finally disembarked the same bus at the same bus stop where I embarked three hours earlier. I walked the short distance home with heavy legs and heart, not looking forward to facing Mother.

I avoided eye contact with Mother, who was sitting in our small living room, and went straight to the one bedroom that the whole family slept in. The other bedroom had been rented out for a meager forty dollars per month to help with the monthly expenses. I collected my pillow from a corner of the wooden bed laden with linoleum that we had and threw my blanket on the cement floor as I attempted to sleep my pain and sorrow away. I was exhausted and fell asleep. I recall my mother shaking me and beckoning me to wake up for dinner. I refused to answer and later told my oldest sister, Susie, that I was not hungry and to not disturb me anymore. I cried myself to sleep after several hours only to be awakened by the crashing of ceramic bowls and plates on the concrete floor in our living room. Tired and with knots in my stomach, I stood at the threshold of our bedroom and living room, watching my father, who was in a drunken stupor, swiping at all the offerings on the altar, sending all the plates, fruits, and foods that were offered that day to the statues of Buddha and goddess of mercy crashing to the cement floor. In Singapore and in most places with the traditions and cultures of Buddhism in the orient, daily prayer with joss sticks (or incense) with offerings of fruits or foods to the deity goddess of mercy and statue of Buddha is customary in exchange for blessings and hope for good luck, health, wealth, and prosperity.

I continued to watch as Father staggered around and listened to his blasphemy and threats to kill the whole family either by using a machete or by killing everybody and setting the house on fire with kerosene. For several years, since I was about seven years old, I would stay up most nights, waiting for Father to return from work to make sure he was not drunk; or if he was drunk, I would make sure that he fell asleep and did not try to carry out any of his threats. I continued to live in fear even at the age of thirteen, not knowing if, and when, Father would actually carry out his threats. Over the years, I have had a few confrontations with Father whereby I would push, kick, or hit him in retaliation whenever he attacked Mother. Somehow, Father had a strange and inexplicable respect or fear for me. I have not spoken to my father since I was about seven years old. I found my father despicable, manipulative, and a pathological liar; and he knew it through my body language and hateful, penetrating looks each time he attempted to say something nice to me when he was sober. I would invariably walk away from him with disgust, not saying a word.

That night, I stood at the threshold with my arms folded, and I stared at my father with disgust. He eyed me, shook his head, laughed, and apologized, swearing for the thousandth time that he would stop drinking. I continued to watch him with folded arms and profound hatred, especially tonight, because he was the reason that Mother was pregnant again. Father staggered to the bathroom and tripped a couple of times, hitting the corner of chairs and tables. I waited for him to stagger back to the living room and eventually fall asleep on the floor before I returned back to my spot on the floor to sleep. I knew Mother was awake, but she did not bother to get up to yell at Father as she usually did, knowing that I was very hurt and disgusted with her being pregnant again. I finally fell asleep after knowing that Father was sound asleep and snoring.

On Sunday morning, I waited for father to clean up the mess he created the night before, shower, and leave the house at around 9:00 a.m. for work as a taxi driver. Father handed forty dollars to Mother and left quickly before Mother started another scene about the insufficient funds. On a Saturday, Father should have been able to collect at least a hundred dollars after putting in twelve hours as a taxi driver, after deducting thirty dollars for taxi rental. Father most likely spent most of his earnings that day on alcohol and gambling. I eyed Mother, daring her to pick a fight with Father. Much to my relief, she did not utter a word.

Mother always favored me growing up. I am the third child of seven children. I was told that I had always been an easy child, always playing quietly on my own and not saying a word until I was about five years old, when I started to communicate with my parents. She also said that I was always good with helping her with my four younger siblings, feeding them, playing with them, or bouncing them on a sarong (tubal device made from fabric that suspends from the ceiling connected to a spring) to put them to sleep. Incidentally, fresh milk was never a commodity in our household. All of us were given sweetened condensed milk diluted in water from birth to about two years old, supplemented with porridge cooked in minced pork or chicken at about six months old. Mother always admired and even respected my tenacity and compassion even at a young age, especially for stepping up to retaliate against Father whenever he tried to assault her. She was also very aware of the fact that I had refused to speak to Father.

Now, Mother was not blameless, often nagging at Father, blaming him for all the lies he told her and for the predicament and fate she was in. Needless to say, Father would get upset, get into a heated argument, and end up assaulting Mother. It was a vicious cycle that repeated itself at least two to three times a week. Mother would often transfer her anger toward her children. She would often scream and yell at Ricky and Jimmy whenever they got into trouble with neighbors, got poor grades, or skipped school. Often, she would vent her anger using a half-inch-in-diameter bamboo cane to discipline Ricky, Jimmy, and sometimes Susie. Mother never laid hands on me for some unknown reason, but we got into frequent heated arguments. Ricky, Susie, and Jimmy would frequently try to shield themselves behind me to avoid being caned. I would usually try to talk Mother out of caning them when I was home.

I vividly remember her locking Ricky in the bathroom on one particular occasion and caning him continuously for several minutes. Poor Ricky was crying and begging for her to stop, but the caning continued. I begged Mother to stop before she killed him, but it was to no avail. I finally had to take a hammer and screwdriver in an attempt to open the flimsy aluminum door to the bathroom. It was then that Mother finally stopped the caning. Poor Ricky was covered with cane stripes with several abrasions all over. I yelled at her, exclaiming, You are heartless and cruel, and you will go to hell for this! I could tell that she regretted what she had done to Ricky as she sat spent and slumped on the couch with tears in her eyes.

After Father left, I started laying out a hundred sheets of sixty-inch-by-thirty inch" brown paper, coated them with starch, and eventually folded them into a hundred grocery bags with a red preprinted advertisement on them. I earned one cent for each bag, and my daily goal was to fold a minimum of a thousand bags to make ten dollars a day. This particular Sunday, I was overwhelmed with mixed emotions. My thoughts were mostly on the impending birth of yet another innocent child to be born into this cruel world.

Mother would wake up each morning at 6:00 a.m. to wash clothing collected each night from two to three neighbors to supplement the income for a mere five dollars per load. She would squat in our small bathroom, scrubbing away on a small wooden washboard, and she would later hang them on the clothesline in our backyard to dry. She also had the family laundry to deal with. She would then go to the wet market nearby to grocery shop for the day. Mother would do her best to make sure the family of nine got fed, but there were days when we would scrape by with rice, anchovies and peanuts, noodles, or pickled vegetables to sustain us.

Susie, the oldest, dropped out of school at sixteen years old and was able to immediately secure a job at Fairchild Electronics working on the assembly line to bring in extra income. She opted to work the night shift for an extra fifty cents; hence, she mostly slept in the daytime, claiming that she was too tired to help with folding paper bags. Ricky, my fifteen-year-old brother, was always too busy hanging out with neighborhood friends and getting into trouble. Helen, at eleven years old, would help with household chores and folding paper bags whenever she felt up to it.

Sunday passed uneventfully. After finishing with folding a thousand bags, I ate dinner and went to bed without uttering a word to Mother, intentionally avoiding her all day. Father returned home early that night at around 7:00 p.m. He was sober and proudly handed a hundred dollars to Mother, and all was well, with Father apologizing to Mother and promising that he would stop drinking and gambling.

I went to school as usual on Monday, walking about two miles with my neighbors and childhood friends, Eng and Lay. The week passed by uneventfully. I continued to avoid Mother, not saying a word to her all week. In my weakness, pain, and suffering, I guess I felt a sense of power and control over a situation I had absolutely no control over. I loved my mother dearly, but I often wondered if it was out of sympathy, pity, and the need to protect her. The constant loud squabbles heard throughout the neighborhood, physical fights, and emotional threats from both parents had definitely traumatized