Singapore History

On the Nice bus from KL to Singapore last Wednesday, I started on, what else, a book by a Singaporean lawyer Philip Jeyaretnam. It's his third book, Abraham's Promise, (pub. 1995) about an old man, Abraham Isaac, who grew up in Singapore and lived through the Japanese Occupation and the politics of the newly independent Singapore. For a young man, the author certainly drew a credible character in Abraham and the times he lived in. It was like a walk through history, his own as well as that of the country.

I felt like I went through the time tunnel to the 50's and 60's too when we visited the Images of Singapore Museum on Sentosa Island. The mannequins were so well done they seemed almost alive. The whole display of the historical events and daily life in the streets and shops and festivals was artfully and superbly put together so that, as I said, I felt like I was back in those days when I was a child. I recognised kitchen implements and china, and a baby chair made of bamboo which doubled as a small table when turned over. Hey, I used to sit in that chair when I was a toddler!

Then suddenly, as we were walking along the exhibits showing the Japanese Occupation period and turned the corner, we saw... my name in big black print on a banner! It was the Sook Ching operation! It was to purge or wipe out the Chinese rebels. Under the operation, thousands of Chinese young men were rounded up and examined as to whether they were rebels or harmless. It was arbitrarily done, as those with glasses or those with tattoos may be deemed dangerous and sent to be killed. Those who passed the test were given a stamp on their bodies or clothes, a stamp of life.

When we came home and I did a google search on Japanese occupation and my name, wow! 342 results. I didn't know that my name meant "to eliminate" in Chinese. Did my parents when they gave me that name? I must ask them soon.

It was in Feb 1942, that fateful month in which the "impregnable fortress" fell, that the Japanese Imperial Army carried out an operation to purge people who were deemed anti-Japanese. Local Chinese came to term this as "Sook Ching" which, literally translated, means "to eliminate". The Chinese had supported the war effort in China through fund-raising campaigns and the boycott of Japanese goods. Besides that, they also served as volunteers in the defence of Singapore and Malaya. So they were the natural targets.(http://www.mindef.gov.sg/history/index.asp?cat=histdisp&id=1)

Quote

"...I will never understand how decisions affecting life and death could be taken so capriciously and casually. I had had a narrow escape from an exercise called "Sook Ching", meaning to "wipe out" rebels..."

Senior Minister, MR LEE KUAN YEW in "The Singapore Story - Memoirs of Lee Kuan Yew".

The thought came to me too: what if my Dad had been killed in the war before he could marry my mother and before I, the eldest of his four children, could be conceived and born? Why I wouldn't be here then, I wouldn't exist! And neither would Ethan nor Elliot today.

No, I don't believe the decisions affecting life and death were arbitrary and capricious in God's view. They may have seemed so, to the human eye, but because I believe in a God who made and designed me and each and every one of us humans, they were not at all in God's plan and story. History is not merely the story of man but even more, it is His Story, His working in and through man.