I stayed in Singapore until early 1940 when we left to join my father in Malacca. We settled on a fruit plantation where there were plenty of fruit trees. Coconuts were in abundance, and they quickly became a staple in our diet.

Then December 1941 arrived and World War II reached our doorstep. I was just 10 years old at the time. Air raid sirens became a daily occurrence. We scrambled to hide in the paddy fields in the countryside, hoping to escape the impending danger. We saw Japanese soldiers riding bicycles in the fields for days. To survive, we resorted to catching wild birds for sustenance. 

When the clear-all siren sounded, we returned to our Malacca hometown, only to find it swarmed with Japanese soldiers. When we saw young boys and girls being detained by the soldiers, we decided to flee back to Singapore. 

After gathering whatever we could carry, we boarded a train at the Malacca railway station. Our journey came to an abrupt halt at Johor due to flooding. We slept on the platform for days, cooking whatever meagre rice we had and eating it with salted fish. Finally the floods subsided and we reached Singapore. 

Our first refuge was a relative's vegetable farm at Tampines 6 Mile. There, we subsisted on farm produce and poultry. Eventually, we moved to Everitt Road in the Katong area.

Food remained a scarce commodity, with rice, sugar, and other essentials rationed. Each family was allocated ration cards based on the number of people in the household, and these precious cards were only redeemable at designated shops. The Japanese commandeered all the eggs and premium food items for themselves. We had to wake up at the crack of dawn, queuing for the unpalatable rock-hard bread made from corn flour, which had to be steamed before consumption.

There was no modern sanitisation so the British prisoners of war were tasked with clearing our waste. At the age of 12, I found work as an office boy in the Japanese army, making drinks and collecting lunches for the soldiers. Before delivering their meals, I would hide some of their good food for myself and eat them later. My meagre salary amounted to just 1 Japanese dollar per day.

Japanese planes stationed at Kallang Civil Airport,

which was turned into a Japanese airbase during WWII.

Credit: Singapore at War by Bob Hackett

Later on, I took up a job as a labourer at the Japanese Air Base, lugging heavy aeroplane tires and propellers. My income saw a modest increase, totaling 2 dollars daily. Meanwhile, my mother set up a stall at the market, selling sweet cakes, cigarettes, and farm produce. When the soldiers at the air base went on vacation, I would steal small items like cigarettes and bananas from their private offices and give them to my mother to sell at her stall. 

I remember eating tapioca kway teow. We'd peel away the first layer of tapioca skin and only use the second layer onwards, slicing it into strips and frying it like kway teow.

Varieties of rice rations, which often had to be cleaned before consuming.

Illustrated by Julia Tay

Some of the rice we purchased through rationing was mixed with lime, presumably to preserve it so we would wash the rice multiple times before cooking it. With rice in short supply, we often resorted to mixing it with tapioca or sweet potatoes.

With rice in short supply, sweet potatoes and tapioca were often added to watery porridge to

bulk up meals

Illustration by Julia Tay

When the end of the war finally came, I returned to Telok Kurau Primary School to continue my education, eventually graduating from Raffles Institution. This is how the war shaped the early years of my life.