Block2Blog

  The lad arrived in Naval Base age 4; at 8 landed general work under a General. Look out for Pt 2: “ Under the Japanese”.

I sure left my heart in Naval Base by Theresa Chua  My only wish if only Naval Base is still around and we’re still living in our paradise aka Shangri-La! A highly protected place at the northern tip of Singapore. No outsiders could enter unless sponsored by a resident with proof of identification. It was truly 'exclusive living' - a la Shangri-La Life was simply carefree, our parents needed only to feed us, there were no bills to pay up, nor fines to pay. We lived with modern sanitation. Neighbours lived so close to each other like skin-to-skin contact but we got along amicably, racial harmony was spontaneous. I would walk into my neighbour's kitchen and ask "What’s cooking?" and I'll be given their day’s curry to savour. The population ratio among the three main races was almost equal, each family having 6 to 7 kids the norm but hey, we did not feel crowded. We had food hawkers plying various blocks from whom we could get our breakfast. We had very ...

  I was a mere boy of 16 (nearly 17) when I first arrived in Singapore . It was my first time of flying anywhere, and on a British Eagle Bristol Britannia (4 propeller) airline which took 26 hours including 2 hours in Istanbul and 2 hours in Bombay (Mumbai now). We landed at Paya Lebar in the early hours of September 15th 1967 and took a RN bus to the Dockyard. I joined HMS Llandaff in the Stores Basin at 4 am in the morning. It's diesel engines were chugging away and I and seven companions from our basic naval training and one more experienced rating walked up the gangway and joined the ship. My memories of those times are vivid because it was such an impressionable age. Naturally, the things that young (or old) Matelot's get up to will not be published here, but I did enjoy the work which was what we in the RN called ' Tropical Routine.' Working from early in the morning until around 1pm and then we were off for the rest of the day. I remember on occasion, wal...

  She too left Naval Base. But NB Never Left Her. Read what Ranee misses about NB in Block  2  Blog (B 2  B) at: thenavalbase.blogspot.com

 What I Miss About Naval Base   The “village vibrancy”! The sounds and sense of our Base which was our whole world then. From the time your neighbours get up and prepare to go to work...be it at the dockyard, home or school, the radios that would be switched on early morning would be left on the whole day, everyone listening to Chinese, Malay, Tamil, English, Hindi and Malayalam songs...in the mornings the sounds of your neighbours bathing, mothers shouting out to children to wake up...the routines of the housewives and children after fathers left for work.  Then would come the lull after the hustle and bustle for a couple of hours after lunch, when tired mums would be taking their siestas and the not so tired little ones sitting on the steps “networking” which were the cause of differences amongst the neighbours!  Then would come the buzz again when afternoon tea, dinners and breakfasts (for the following morning), would be prepared till the siren wen...

Growing Up.           When I was growing up in the Naval Base, during the '60s,  our parents, like most parents, depended solely on their occupations in the Dockyard to provide a livelihood for their families.             Wages were mostly paid weekly. Our parents like most breadwinners earned sustenance sums, enough to meet our weekly basic household needs such as purchasing inexpensive outfits to clothe our famished bodies; regular, rather than fashionable footwear to protect our feet; and the biggest challenge was laying food on the table for 8 growing children, with growing appetites.                  Hence there was hardly any money left, to save in the kitty. We were lucky if the weekly wages could meet our weekly needs.              Hence, under such circumstance, some mothers were forced to seek work, i...