Halcyon Baba Days

Appears in
Growing Up In A Nonya Kitchen
Growing Up In A Nonya Kitchen

By Sharon Wee

Published 2012

  • About

Clockwise from top left:

‘Maidstone’ at 42 Cairnhill Road, where my grandfather threw parties to celebrate his mother’s birthday;

Cheang Hong Lim, my mother’s great grandfather; Mrs Cheang

Hong Lim née Yeo Bee Neo; Cheang Jim Chuan, my mother’s grandfather; Chan Kim Hong Neo, wife of Cheang Jim Chuan;

Chia Gin Tee, mother of Chan Kim Hong Neo.

My mother, Polly, was born in 1930 in British colonial Singapore, in a seaside bungalow along Pasir Panjang. In our family, we nicknamed this area ‘Long Beach’ since ‘Pasir’ and ‘Panjang’ were Malay words for sand and long respectively.