Singathology

by Gwee Li Sui

  The poet felt “shame to speak of poverty while reciting scripture”. Were his friends aware of this, the ones raising funds to buy military planes?

  6

  A year passed by. On 4 August 1915, the Straits Settlement Association’s local branch organised a concert at Victoria Theatre to mark the first anniversary of war being declared, with Governor Arthur Young in attendance. The event was meant to express loyalty towards the British, and both “Rule Britannia” and the British national anthem were sung. For the next three years, the organisation commemorated the occasion in the same way.

  Not long after the concert, on 30 August, Song Ong Siang proposed in The Straits Times that all “natural-born British subjects… not of European descent” should form a patriotic league. The Straits Chinese British Association took up the suggestion and set up a committee.

  All the ideas that Song Ong Siang put forward were accepted: essentially to “respectfully offer our humble services to His Majesty the King” and to “organise a registration of all British subjects of Chinese descent in this Colony”, ensuring that they were “available and willing to do their duty”. The committee also states that, “as the Straits Chinese British Association is by its nature and constitution practically a patriotic league for British subjects of Chinese descent, an invitation be now extended to all Chinese who are British subjects to join the Association”.

  In the event, the proposed registration was a failure. Song Ong Siang later said that most of the people they interviewed were afraid of the League having an ulterior motive for this registration.

  7

  Due to their family backgrounds, the Straits Chinese stood out among the overseas Chinese. On 5 February 1914, The Straits Times published an article by a special contributor, entitled “The Straits-born Chinese: Character and Tendencies”, discussing the cultural identification and political goals of this community.

  This essay noted that, at the dawn of the twentieth century, many Singapore Straits-born Chinese families had already been around for five or six generations or more although third- or fourth-generation immigrants were in the majority. There had recently been some descendants with Chinese blood on both sides but not many.

  The Straits Times article took the standpoint of the colonial government, opining that “the most important consideration is undoubtedly to ascertain what is the attitude of this important section of the community towards the alien civilisation which surrounds them on all sides as well as towards the authority which governs them”. The government was evidently confident on this point, believing that “they are law-abiding, self-restraining, and reliable, [which] may safely be attributed to the racial temperament”, that “they are loyal to the authorities and to their foreign employers, comparatively free from criminal taint, and self-respecting, [which] may be due to the ameliorating circumstances of their climatic, educational, and economic environment”. Their success evidently combined cultures of East and West.

  This was three years after revolutionaries had overthrown the Manchu Qing Dynasty and established the Republic of China, but the article continued about how “the recent upheavals of the political situation in China did not affect this plodding, matter-of-fact, steady-going community to any appreciable extent” – although “they sympathised in some measure with the aims and projects of the revolutionists”, “they would never voluntarily jeopardise their personal security, or cripple and injure their material resources and vested interests, at the call of a host of fanatical and unpractical schemers”.

  There was also mention of a different group of Chinese people: “Contrast this apathetic and indifferent conduct with the enthusiasm and alacrity displayed by the half-informed mining coolie of the Peninsula, who freely offered the earnings of several months and volunteered for military service in the cause of the revolutionists, and one is at once struck with the wide difference in the educational and economic status of the two.”

  When it came to the education of the next generation, the paper noted: “The Straits Chinese have boldly departed from the usual practice of their neighbours. To equip themselves for their present position in life, as well as to preserve their accumulated wealth, and to establish a sure basis for ultimate systematic culture, they have preferred to give their children a good sound English education.” The Westerners did not particularly agree with this because “the neglect to provide or to encourage the acquisition of some adequate Chinese learning among the younger generation is very much to be deprecated” as “for a Chinaman therefore to be deprived of the invigorating stimulus of his country’s literature is indeed to be denationalised.” There is no support for the Straits-born Chinese ambition to “establish a sure basis for ultimate systematic culture”.

  The article concluded that “To-day the whole East is vibrating with new ideals, new hopes, and new courage in the future” and that “the historical continuity of a great race and nation could not be wantonly set aside”.

  The conclusions of this century-old essay seem just as apposite a hundred years later even if events during that time had not unfolded as the writer predicted. People from a hundred years before and a hundred years later see the world and its events from the same perspective, making history seem like a dream.

  8

  Not long after the start of 1915, on 19 January, Kung Tian Cheng, a personal advisor of China’s President Yuan Shikai, died of smallpox.

  Thirty-six-year-old Kung Tiang Cheng was born in Malacca and later studied in India. He became an interpreter at the Chinese Protectorate in Penang, then the chief clerk at Singapore’s Raffles Library. In 1910, he travelled to China and, in his second year there, thanks to a recommendation from Yuan Shikai’s advisor George Ernest Morrison, became Yuan’s interpreter. In 1914, he was appointed head librarian of the Presidential Library and an advisor to Yuan.

  About Kung’s death, Song Ong Siang said: “His passing away caused people to take note that the Straits-born Chinese – as long as they possess a good knowledge of Chinese, the language of bureaucracy – can without any difficulty flourish in a domain of greater efficacy and responsibility than the little colony of Singapore.”

  Song Ong Siang’s words express more than just the deepest thoughts of a Straits-born Chinese.

  9

  Finally, we arrive at 9 August, 1915.

  A hundred years ago, no one in Singapore could have known that Singaporeans would currently be celebrating fifty years of independence.

  A hundred years ago, what would people in Singapore have done on 9 August? What happened in Singapore on that day?

  Reports in the two newspapers of the time go in different directions with almost no common ground. The Lat Pau of 9 and 10 August focuses on the floods in Guangdong, with reports and announcements on aid from Singaporean organisations.

  The Pearl River began overflowing in the last ten days of June, creating serious floods that affected cities in almost a hundred counties in Guangdong, Guangxi, Hunan, and Jiangxi.

  According to the Lat Pau, “on this occasion, Singapore donated generously, more than ever before”. There were all kinds of initiatives, from writing to help raise funds to coffee shops donating the proceeds of hot drink sales and hotels selling Western meals and mooncakes as a benefit, and even performances in support of the relief effort.

  The Straits Times did not cover this story at all. Their second edition of 9 August praised the Russian aircraft Ilia Mourometz, suggesting that it surpassed Germany’s Zeppelin airships. The third edition featured the British in Thailand who had returned to the UK to take part in the war. On 10 August, there was a report regarding the British Board of Trade’s inquiry into the sinking of a ship.

  Apart from the gathering to mark the first anniversary of the declaration of war on 4 August, One Hundred Years’ History of the Chinese in Singapore mentions that, on 12 August, Lim Boon Keng returned to the Legislative Council, replacing Tan Jiak Kim, who was stepping down. Is One Hundred Years’ History of the Chinese in Si
ngapore essentially a history of the Straits Chinese or of Chinese Singaporeans in the upper echelons of society?

  What is history?

  The Singapore of a hundred years ago answers history in these varied ways.

  10

  Humankind is fond of war. Twenty-five years after the Great War ended, just one generation, a second world war exploded into being.

  Fortunately, the world seemed to draw some lessons from these conflicts and, twenty-five years after World War II, contented itself with a Cold War. Twenty-five plus two years after this, on 25 December 1991, Christmas Day, the Soviet Union leader Gorbachev resigned, and, that night, the Soviet flag was slowly lowered over the Kremlin. Without the fires of war, a major nation had suffered defeat and disintegration. This was the end of an era. What followed swiftly was “the age of Big Brother”.

  Another twenty-five years has passed since then, and the world remains at peace, thanks to Big Brother and many other big brothers. And, in this year, this little island is preparing to mark fifty years of independence.

  On 5 August 2014, Lianhe Zaobao reported that three local organisations were commemorating the centenary of World War I, with the title “One Hundredth Anniversary of World War I, a Reminder that Peace is Precious.”

  What should we predict for the next twenty-five years and the next?

  I hope we will indeed be able to “move our beds beneath the shady reach of trees”.

  1 C. M. Turnbull, A History of Modern Singapore, 1819-2005 (Singapore: NUS Press, 2009).

  2 Song Ong Siang, One Hundred Years’ History of the Chinese in Singapore (London: J. Murray, 1923).

  3 H. F. Pearson, Singapore: A Popular History, 1819-1960 (Singapore: Eastern Universities Press, 1961).

  4 Quoted in Chiou Sin Min’s The Life of Khoo Seok Wan (Singapore: Seng Yew Book Store, 1993).

  Hotel: An Excerpt

  BY ALFIAN SA’AT

  HENRY William Comber, an English rubber planter

  MARGARET Ann Comber, his Eurasian wife

  JOHN Tessensohn, a Eurasian clerk

  DAWOOD, an Indian bellboy

  The year is 1915. HENRY enters a hotel room in one of the luxury hotels in Singapore, followed by MARGARET and DAWOOD. DAWOOD is carrying the Combers’ luggage.

  HENRY: And here we are. Finally!

  MARGARET: Oh Henry, it’s really quite splendid.

  HENRY [to DAWOOD]: You can leave our trunks in that corner now, boy.

  DAWOOD: Excuse me, Mr. Comber, which corner please, sir?

  MARGARET: You speak English!

  DAWOOD: Just little bit only, Mrs. Comber.

  MARGARET: Do you all speak English in Singapore?

  DAWOOD: Some working hotel, we learn.

  HENRY: It’s Mr. Comber, by the way. [Pronounced “coma”.]

  DAWOOD: Oh. But there is a “b”.

  HENRY: It’s a tricky language, English. Not all words sound like the way they are spelled. There’s “combine” and “combust” and… “combobulate”. And then there’s “Comber”.

  DAWOOD: Sorry, sahib. I’m still learning.

  HENRY: Most certainly you are. That corner over there, please. Beside the wardrobe.

  DAWOOD: Very good, sahib.

  DAWOOD puts down the luggage. MARGARET takes a few coins out of her purse.

  MARGARET: What is your name, boy?

  DAWOOD: Dawood.

  MARGARET: Dowd.

  DAWOOD: No, memsahib. It’s two sounds. Da.

  MARGARET: Da.

  DAWOOD: Wood. Dawood.

  MARGARET: Dawood. Is that a Tamil name?

  DAWOOD: No. I come from Awadh.

  MARGARET: Where is that, Henry?

  HENRY: My dear Margaret, just because I have a hundred Indian coolies under my charge hardly makes me an expert on India.

  DAWOOD: It’s North part, memsahib.

  MARGARET: So you don’t speak Tamil then?

  DAWOOD: No, Urdu.

  MARGARET: And you’re a Mohammedan?

  DAWOOD: Yes, memsahib.

  HENRY: Margaret, don’t put the wrong ideas in the boy’s head.

  MARGARET: What ideas?

  HENRY: We don’t want him to think that he’s being interviewed for a job now, do we?

  MARGARET: No, I’m sorry. Here you go.

  MARGARET passes DAWOOD some coins from her purse.

  DAWOOD: Thank you, memsahib. Thank you, sahib. If anything you want, please use telephone.

  MARGARET: Thank you, Dawood.

  DAWOOD exits.

  HENRY: Now how did that fellow know our name?

  MARGARET: He must have read it on our luggage.

  HENRY: I find that a little inquisitive.

  MARGARET: He was just being observant.

  HENRY: And how much did you give him?

  MARGARET: Does it matter, Henry?

  HENRY: Of course, it matters. We wouldn’t want you throwing my money around like that.

  MARGARET: It’s just a few coins.

  HENRY: How many?

  MARGARET: I don’t know, Henry.

  HENRY: I hope they were mostly half-cent coins. Even better if they were quarter cents.

  MARGARET: He was very helpful with our luggage.

  HENRY: That happens to be his job.

  MARGARET: It’s always good to leave a good impression.

  HENRY: It is not our duty to leave a good impression, Margaret, on those who are working for us. Especially when the money you spend to secure that good impression does not come from your own income.

  MARGARET: I just don’t want him to think that we’re poor.

  HENRY: No. You want him to think that you’re kind. If we were poor, we wouldn’t be able to afford this suite.

  MARGARET: It’s beautiful.

  HENRY: Only the best.

  MARGARET: It makes me wonder what I’d possibly done to deserve all of this.

  HENRY: You married me.

  They kiss.

  HENRY: Oh yes. Before I forget.

  HENRY takes out a rectangular case from his breast pocket.

  MARGARET: What is this, Henry?

  HENRY: Something to go with your wedding band.

  MARGARET opens the box. It is a necklace. She gasps.

  HENRY: Shall I put it on you?

  MARGARET: Yes please.

  MARGARET puts on the necklace. She looks at herself in a mirror.

  MARGARET: You’ve made me feel like a cat now.

  HENRY: A cat?

  MARGARET: I can’t decide now if I want to stay indoors or go outside. Should I just stay here and admire my necklace in the mirror or go out and have other people admire it?

  HENRY: There’s nothing feline about that, my dear. It’s part of a woman’s constitution to be perpetually indecisive. But it’s also what I find most charming about you.

  MARGARET: That I’m indecisive?

  HENRY: That you can’t make up your mind.

  MARGARET: I did make up my mind to be your wife.

  HENRY: Did you? My father used to say that courtship is a process by which a man makes up a woman’s mind for her.

  MARGARET: So tell me what I want then.

  HENRY: I think you’d like to explore the town for a bit.

  MARGARET: I would very much like that, actually.

  HENRY: And then, after dinner, we can come back to the hotel. And I guarantee you that we’ll be spending a lot of time in the room.

  MARGARET moves away from HENRY and sits on the bed, with her back to him.

  HENRY: What is the matter, Margaret?

  MARGARET: I would like to have a moment’s peace, Henry.

  HENRY: Whatever for?

  MARGARET: To pray. One must always be thankful for one’s blessings.

  HENRY goes to the telephone to make a call.

  HENRY: Hello, Briggins? Yes, old chap. We’ve just settled in. I was wondering if… oh, that’s no problem, really. We all get a little overwhelmed. On his way? You shouldn’t have. But awfully good of you
to arrange that for us. We’re much obliged.

  He puts down the telephone.

  HENRY: You know my friend Briggins?

  MARGARET: Is he the barrister?

  HENRY: Yes, and a member of the Legislative Council. He’d initially promised to show us around. But there’s a big event today, and he can’t quite remove himself from it.

  MARGARET: I suppose we shall have to make do on our own.

  HENRY: Oh, but there’s some good news out of this. We’re invited to the event.

  MARGARET: What event is this? It sounds important.

  HENRY: Let’s just say that it’s not something that we’re likely to witness again in our lifetimes.

  MARGARET: Oh, Henry. Don’t keep me in suspense.

  HENRY: You’ll be delighted to know that some of the most prominent members of Singapore’s high society will be in attendance.

  MARGARET: Whatever shall I wear? I’m not even sure I packed my best dress.

  MARGARET opens up her trunks and takes out some clothes.

  HENRY: Briggins has sent down one of his clerks to escort us to the event. He’ll be arriving very soon.

  MARGARET: But I’m not ready.

  HENRY: I think what you’re wearing will do nicely.

  MARGARET: But if society will be there… how about this one? Or maybe this one?

  HENRY: It’s not a ball, Margaret. The event’s taking place outdoors.

  MARGARET: Is it a derby? But I haven’t even brought along a derby hat.

  HENRY: It’s a public execution.

  Pause.

  MARGARET: That’s not funny, Henry.

  HENRY: You don’t think it’s a capital idea?

  MARGARET: If there is fact in what you are proposing, then I do not countenance this flippancy.

  HENRY: Of course, they don’t hold public executions for amusement in Singapore. They’re very civilised here.

  MARGARET: But why are we going?

  HENRY: As I said, it’s not something one gets to see every day.

  MARGARET: On our honeymoon?