Part V: Mr Herald Bangras

HERALD: So long, 10 years, which means you are talking about from Primary 1 to Sec 4. We’ve done all that already. We can’t go back to Malaysia and learn Malay as our first language and do everything in Malay. That’s not, we can’t, imagine doing something like that. So there’s no way we can follow him so the thing was, he was afraid that he had to go and, and it did happen. So when it did happen right, he, he went off on his own and it’s too expensive to come back every day or every week, come back and see us for the weekend and go back. He didn’t do that so it will be like he will be away for stretch of three months or so and then he will come back for a while, ya. INTERVIEWER: And this was in your about, probably in your early ’20s? HERALD: This was when I was in the army, ya. INTERVIEWER: Okay, okay. HERALD: But you see, what kind of problem this has caused us as a family. It really caused, disrupted our lives a lot because once the officer gets transferred out, no more in Singapore to wherever in Malaysia, you lose the right to stay. INTERVIEWER: In the quarters. HERALD: In the quarters. INTERVIEWER: Right, right. So you all had ... HERALD: So we all had to move. So when we moved and we were, and because my mum was a PR and we were not old enough ... INTERVIEWER: You couldn’t get a flat. HERALD: We couldn’t get, we were not 21 yet so we couldn’t get a flat so we were really, really homeless, seriously homeless. We didn’t know where to go. INTERVIEWER: So what did you guys do? HERALD: So we basically had to go back to, to the Malaysian customs and ask them and pleaded, pleaded with them to allow us to stay in the quarters. They said, they gave us, ya, like two or three months more to look for a place and we were very desperate because we had to leave by a certain time. Then, then they said okay, we will put you on another place. If you want you can go here but it cost more, which is another and that is also limited period also like I think at the most one year and then you got to be off on your own. So they moved us out to this place along Pasir Panjang, which is another customs officers’ quarters. INTERVIEWER: Right, right, okay. HERALD: But that one was even bigger. It’s for senior customs officers, those very, very senior ones so okay, they get that place. So we went there and lived there for a year and then after that we have to go off again. INTERVIEWER: Oh dear. HERALD: So we, we know it was like that so ... INTERVIEWER: Itinerant, it’s very itinerant. HERALD: It’s very and you know, we were all schooling or, it was, it was, so what happened was, I was coming to the end of my JC and then I was going to go into army already, NS, so wasn’t too bad because I didn’t have to come back home but you know, my mum with my older sister and my younger brother still had to find a place to stay so she went around to ask this lady from our church and she, she lives in Spottiswoode Park. So she asked, “Could you take the three of us in?” My, the other two, that’s me and my other brother, my other brother joined the Singapore Air Force so he could stay ... INTERVIEWER: So effectively he had a roof over his head. HERALD: Ya, me because I’m doing NS, I, you know, I only come back on the weekends so not too much of a problem. If I wanted I could just stay in camp right. So the thing was the three of them. So she asked this lady and the lady said, she was a very nice lady, she said okay. But she also said that only for a certain period. So she took them in for I think about 6 months or so like that in Spottiswoode Park. INTERVIEWER: So no matter where you guys are moving, you were always so close to the station and the railway, Spottiswoode as well. HERALD: Ya, ya. Then after that, it really became very desperate right. We, we really needed to find, from Spottiswoode Park we moved to our, this one was very far, Flower Road. INTERVIEWER: I have heard of this. HERALD: Flower Road in Upper Serangoon off Kovan and all that. INTERVIEWER: Yes, Kovan, nearer to Hougang actually. HERALD: Hougang, so one of our relatives lives in pretty nice terrace house over there, double storey, so they said same thing, you can live here for about six months and then after that so same thing, they moved over there. When I, when I got to book out of camp, you know, I will go there and my mum was depressed because she, you know, she was, because wherever she went she couldn’t find a proper place to ... INTERVIEWER: Settle. HERALD: And you know when you live in other people’s houses, you just don’t get the privacy, you know, you, you, you can’t do whatever you want, your freedom, no freedom, constraint, so she had a very tough time. So then, finally we went begging to HDB, say, “Can you give us a place? Any place.” Then they went like, “Ya, we can’t give you two-room, three-room you know.” Then we were like, “Not even a two-room?” “No, we have a one-room if you want.” So we were like, “one-room?” INTERVIEWER: Rental one-room? HERALD: Rental, so guess where? Outram, so ... INTERVIEWER: Back to the railway. HERALD: So we went back from there, went back to Outram, stayed in a one-room place and this time INTERVIEWER: But wouldn’t your sister have been old by then to buy ... HERALD: She’s Malaysian. INTERVIEWER: Oh gosh, so it would have been down to you as Singaporean. HERALD: And you know, I’m still in the army, so, so my, we have to wait. We lived there I think for two years? Two years, all in a one-room, one-room apartment. Quite, I ended up sleeping like, we, we were sleeping in the living room, like the living room itself was so small and it’s basically the, your bedroom, living room is, is, so okay, so that’s how we lived for about two years. We waited for my brother, who was in the Air Force, to reach 21. So after he reached 21, then he could apply with my mum for a flat and that’s what we did. The minute he got 21, that’s the first thing he did and we bought a apartment, HDB flat in Bishan. INTERVIEWER: Bishan? HERALD: Ya, five-room. INTERVIEWER: Is your home still in Bishan? HERALD: No, it’s been, because, so my, my brother, basically it’s his flat right, so when he got married, then the name got transferred to the wife and so on, so and then he sold it off and then we moved again. So my mum is now staying on her own. INTERVIEWER: But very much the locus of your, of your family, despite where you moved, you always seems to have some connection back to the railway and some connection back to Tanjong Pagar, Tanjong Pagar station. That was an amazing story. HERALD: Ya, ya. INTERVIEWER: Maybe I could just hop onto some of the other questions? I think we mentioned the people in the railway, what, what did you like the most? I figured it must be the community spirit? HERALD: Ya, the community, how we celebrated all the festivals together, you know, and the freedom that we had to explore, you know, we ... INTERVIEWER: Around, along the line. HERALD: Along the lines, you know, you can climb trees, you can pluck fruits, you can, you know, you can hide, you can go hide away somewhere and just sit down and talk, you know, amazing. INTERVIEWER: Amazing. Did you ever go back to the station when you heard that it was going to close? HERALD: Yes. INTERVIEWER: So you went to visit it again in 2011? HERALD: Yeah. INTERVIEWER: How do you recall the feeling of it, you know? HERALD: I mean, obviously, I think I went there with my, I can’t remember whether I did this or not, I think I did go back with my wife. Of course my wife is not from that area so, but I went there with my wife, my children and I think my mum if I’m not wrong. INTERVIEWER: Oh okay, okay. HERALD: You know, we, if I’m not wrong, ya, my mum followed us as well. So we just started taking, snapping pictures, you know and you know, basically reminiscing about all the things we did and so on, ya. INTERVIEWER: Did you ever go back to the staff quarters? HERALD: It’s not there. INTERVIEWER: Oh! Leveled? HERALD: Ya, it’s not there. I think it’s all leveled, ya, ya, it’s all leveled because the access to the quarters from Kampong Bahru is no more there. INTERVIEWER: Oh, the road is not there? HERALD: It’s not there anymore and it, the whole stretch has been set aside for container, containers INTERVIEWER: Oh, storage? HERALD: Storage, ya so it’s very sad to see the whole place just gone, ya so it’s, I, there’s no way of going back there to, to ... INTERVIEWER: Take photos or to see. HERALD: Take photos or anything like that. It’s all gone already. INTERVIEWER: That’s why your memories are so important. HERALD: Ya, because I, I don’t know whether Spooner Road is still there. INTERVIEWER: I think it is. HERALD: If Spooner Road is there right, you should go there and take picture. INTERVIEWER: Right, right. HERALD: Of that block, that stretch, because there, at that junction of Kampong Bahru and Spooner Road, right, at that junction there, there is this mama shop [Indian provisional store] ... INTERVIEWER: Okay. HERALD: Okay, this Indian mama shop that they sell, you know, your small little grocery, rice, flour, you know, sweets and things like that, ya, so we, when my mum ask me to go and get stuff right, let’s say we had friends over and she wants to buy maybe orange, drinks or whatever, she will send me off and it will take, it will take me like 5 min to get to that place, buy the thing and come back so that’s one little, but it’s no more there also. I don’t think it’s there anymore. It’s, it’s just like a shed, you know, the wooden shed and then, but if you go into that road, that is the road that you, you can also take if you want to get to the market. INTERVIEWER: Oh. HERALD: Ya, so you, you get out of where I stayed, you get out, it’s a very short walk to Spooner Road and then there’s that long road, the Spooner Road goes all the way to the end and then there’s a gate that you have to go pass and you hit the railway tracks. From the railway tracks you can move down to Nelson Road Market. INTERVIEWER: Oh, okay, okay. I would, maybe I would try and do that track. I think the Spooner Road flats are still there. I think there were people living there all the way until 2011 when the station closed and then the KTM staff moved back to JB or to Woodlands because you know the checkpoint is now there. Okay, right, oh this is the question we asked everybody. As you know there’s still debate about what to do about the railway line and the Tanjong Pagar station. Some people, you know, there’ve been various ideas floated, whether to turn it, keep it green, turn, build condos or whatever. There’s also debate about how, what should happen to the station and as you know, they are not going to destroy it but they haven’t really decided what to do with it. In your opinion, what would you like to see for the station or the, and or the rail corridor? HERALD: So the station I think it’s a good thing that they are preserving it. INTERVIEWER: Thank goodness for that. HERALD: Tanjong Pagar station, because there is a lot of history there, also I think that one possible idea is to create a trip down memory lane, you know, like a photo gallery within the lobby area, you know, so that people, and even things like this, you know, your ... INTERVIEWER: Yes, the memories and the conventions here. HERALD: Ya, you know, where people can relive how it was, you know, for people who lived around that area. INTERVIEWER: Right, okay, okay. So kind of a exhibition or a exhibition space. HERALD: Ya, but you know, it’s something, it’s pictures, it’s sound, audio, everything in that area so you, you basically go back to that area to ... INTERVIEWER: Experience it. HERALD: Experience it, rather than going to some museum and then you know, then hearing all these things. You can go back there and then and hear it for yourself and try and relive what ... INTERVIEWER: The atmosphere of the place itself. HERALD: The atmosphere, ya. INTERVIEWER: So because, do you think the physical space is important? HERALD: Yes, I really think so. I think we are too quick to, to, to demolish and rebuild and all that. I think you need to retain some of these things for our heritage like for now right, I can, I have already brought my sons to Tanjong Pagar station but they can never really experience the freedom and the, the joy of, of community living like I did. INTERVIEWER: Right, right, yes. HERALD: Right, I can express it to them, I can relate it to them right, but they are never going to actually ... INTERVIEWER: Immerse themselves in the actual ... HERALD: Really know how we felt. INTERVIEWER: Yes. HERALD: You know, so the next best thing is to maybe create the memories in a more tangible manner for them, because I think it’s important for them to know. INTERVIEWER: Yes. HERALD: The history of where they came from or where their grandparents came from. INTERVIEWER: How, how we got here and ... HERALD: How we got here, I mean, look at my, my family, very good example. Father Malaysian, mother from India, okay. You would think that we are Hindus. We are not Hindus, we are Christians, Catholics. INTERVIEWER: Yes. HERALD: You know my mum is a ... INTERVIEWER: Diehard. HERALD: Diehard Catholic going back many hundreds of years. INTERVIEWER: Wow! HERALD: She’s from Kerala. INTERVIEWER: Ah Kerala! HERALD: So Kerala ... INTERVIEWER: Is very Christian. HERALD: Ya, they, they, they, you have both Syrian Catholics and you have the Roman Catholics. INTERVIEWER: Yes. HERALD: So the mum’s parents’ parents all, you know, are all Catholics so very strong. So when they come here, how do they meet? You know, they were, they were, they were match-made, ya so these are things that they should, if you want to remember how you, your parents, where did you come from, how the history, I think it’s important because it will, that emotional attachment will be there. INTERVIEWER: Yes. HERALD: You cannot just be said that, “Eh! I am a Singaporean.” But okay, what, what is that emotional connection with Singapore? INTERVIEWER: Yes. HERALD: Then you go like, “Don’t know, I like the food here, the Singlish that we speak, ya, that makes me Singaporean,” Yes, but there is, is there something that ... INTERVIEWER: You can point to. HERALD: Roots, rooted, where is the rootedness? And things like that are the ones that are ... INTERVIEWER: The station and the track. HERALD: Yes, you know, how you grew up and so on. I think that is very important because you can go to whatever country right, but then if you don’t have that emotional connection, then you going, you going to just leave. INTERVIEWER: Yes, yes. HERALD: But if you have already this kind of emotional connection, that’s great. But if you don’t see it on the ground, everything is going to be leveled and you know, there’s going to be rebuilding, good for Singapore economically, but I think in terms of ... INTERVIEWER: Identity and ... HERALD: Ya, we, I think we lost something there. I think it’s okay to, to preserve the, the corridor, the railway corridor but looking at how we will never see these trains already coming through them, then also it doesn’t make sense to, to say that the entire corridor should be .. INTERVIEWER: Can’t be touched, ya. HERALD: Can’t be touched, so, but then there must be these selected areas where you really preserved it for what it is and see whether they can, like for example, along the Bukit Timah area, the, the, where the railway runs, it will be quite nice for it to be connected someway with the nature reserve and then the, so there’s continuity, you see. INTERVIEWER: That’s a good point, yes, that’s a good point. HERALD: Ya, ya, so you, we have to keep that continuity there. If, I’m not saying every part of the railway should be, but then when you try to preserve any part it should be the part that has continuity with the area around it like the, so let’s say if we wanted to go out on a trekking, just a trekking expedition, so we go through Mandai or we go through the Bukit Timah Nature Reserve, maybe there’s one path that leads towards the railway, then that railway becomes another experience as well for the trackers. INTERVIEWER: Like, like the tree-top walk or something like that? HERALD: Yes, something like that, ya. INTERVIEWER: That’s, that’s really good, actually that’s really good suggestion. No one has said that yet, connecting the nature reserve. I mean in, in that kind of way to create an experiential process for people who would want to see nature and history and heritage at the same time. Maybe in Bukit Brown Cemetery ought to be natural ... HERALD: Yes, yes, definitely and you know the Bukit Timah station also? INTERVIEWER: Ya, ya. HERALD: I think that one also should, I don’t know. INTERVIEWER: I hope they save it. I think so, I think they will, I, but I don’t know what the decision is on that yet. Okay, anyway HERALD, thank you. HERALD: No problem! INTERVIEWER: So much for, for, for what a wonderful and fascinating interview and I’m really glad that we got to talk to you about the staff quarters. I think the staff quarters and the turkey and the, and, and, and actually there was this surrounding area because you know a lot of people don’t, they, they lived, they kind of have a connection to the railway in their way but your dad’s story and all that has been fascinating. I’m really glad we have a chance to sit down for this. HERALD: Actually part of the, you know the, it’s also regretful that because of that constant changing of homes, moving from one place to another, we lost a lot of things. INTERVIEWER: So photos and all that? HERALD: Photos all gone. INTERVIEWER: I was going to ask you, no, no photos? Not even one or two? Anything from 2011 when you went to, to ... HERALD: We have some, I mean those that I went to take, I did take some photos. INTERVIEWER: Right, right. HERALD: But the old photos are all gone because we had to store it somewhere at a warehouse and we couldn’t take it along with us, all our belongings and stuff, you know, we couldn’t take it with us because we just kept moving. INTERVIEWER: Sure. HERALD: From one place to another. INTERVIEWER: Sure. HERALD: So we just put it in a warehouse. That warehouse, and we paid a rent to this one guy, I can’t remember, my mum’s contact, so he was made in charge, put in charge of taking care of that stuff for us. He didn’t really take care of it for us, so, so the roof over the, was leaking. INTERVIEWER: Oh! HERALD: And it destroyed almost everything we had there so we had to just get rid of everything there, ya. INTERVIEWER: Gosh! HERALD: So we, so we lost quite a lot of our memories. That’s why when you called me and said, “Eh, you know, we are doing this Singapore Memories Project”, I really thought that it’s important that I, I do this also, ya, because you know your photos gone, everything gone, what do you have. INTERVIEWER: The memories, your memories. HERALD: Only memories, but these memories are ought to share with people also. INTERVIEWER: Yes. HERALD: I also want to share with of course my kids. I think it’s important that they, they, they have all these somewhere.