Contributed by: Alice Lin Meng Hua, 84
Mdm Lim was born in 1929 and spent her childhood years on Pulau Bukom Kechil, a little island off Singapore. Many of us will not remember this island as it has already been converted to an oil refinery.
She fondly remembers her favourite pastime of swimming and fishing. As the houses were not actually on the island and were instead set on stilts in the sea, she loved to jump into the sea and play in the water with her friends. Her group of friends consisted of 6 other girls and they went everywhere together, be it to the movies (a weekly event where a projector and screen would be set up on the island and villagers would flock to the cement tiered seats) or, occasionally, to Mainland Singapore for a little shopping.
Mdm Lim was also the only child in her family, and thus she started helping out in her father’s provision shop at the age of 13. To her, who had not been to school due to the high costs and inaccessibility, the transactions and bills were a source of interest from which she could often pick up a new word or two. She remembers how sometimes, customers who were unable to pay at the moment would take a loan and would come back to pay when they received their monthly salary; theirs was a community of trust. Besides helping out in the shop, she was also in charge of cooking the meals for her family of 5, which included her grandparents, parents, and herself. Their meals consisted of steamed fish, which was an easy commodity seeing as the sea was just at their doorstep, and stir fried vegetables with rice.
Being in a Chinese family, she celebrated festivals such as Chinese New Year, Mid Autumn Festival and the Dumpling Festival. During the Chinese New Year, neighbours and extended family were invited over and they would cook up a sumptuous feast of prawns, meat, chicken, and curry. After dinner, the younger children would also play with firecrackers while the adults sat around chit chatting. For the Dumpling Festival, Mdm Lim recalls making Nyonya dumplings. The meat filling would be prepared the day before, and on the actual day, she would have to get up early in the morning to wrap the dumplings. Nowadays, though, she often buys the dumplings.
When she was 19 years old, Mdm Lim married her cousin. When asked whether she had had boyfriends and gone dating before, Mdm Lim exclaimed that she had never done any of these; her marriage had been pre-arranged by her parents. Theirs was a traditional Teochew wedding, with the usual rituals and dowry. After marriage, the couple moved to Balestier Road on Mainland Singapore. Mdm Lim remembers how the streets were filled with pushcarts and stall owners hawking their wares. As there were no shopping centres back then, all daily necessities and food items were sold through these pushcarts stalls. When she was about 30 years old, the couple moved again to Serangoon Road, with their 3 children in tow. They had a total of 8 children now.
Nowadays, Mdm Lim lives in a terrace house, near Serangoon Gardens, with some of her children. She is still actively contributing back to society by selling her handicraft such as little handbags and blankets at her Church, and donating all proceed to the Cancer Society and orphanages. When there are Church funfairs, you can also find her selling homemade acah.
Mdm Lim is a truly respectable member of the society. Although she had received little education, she was independent and learned Chinese on her own while helping out at the provisional shop. Not only that, she contributes to the society so that the warmth from her hands can be felt by more people.
Interview done by Lee Pei Qi, Ng Ru Hui and Erin Siah from Nanyang Girls' High School on 26 June 2013.
(This memory is collected in collaboration with Nanyang Girls' High School for the "Hands: Gift of a Generation" campaign.)
