I attended Japanese school during the war, and I was about 7 years old at that time. They would distribute little starchy pieces of cake, which I would bring home. My grandmother would stir-fry them into kway teow, which were thick, flat noodles. My father would bring home rationed rice, but it often had kutu (small insects like mites) or cockroach faeces in it. My grandmother would ask us kids to painstakingly clean the rice grain by grain.

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We lived in a kampung near the sea, so we would go and see if we could get any small leftover fish from the fishermen who couldn’t sell them. We would also hunt for clams, known as lala, in the mud by the sea, and they were about the size of cherry tomatoes. To catch them, we'd put our hands into the mud and dig for them. Once we had a handful, we'd wash the clams with tap water and then place them over embers of driftwood. There was always a cooking fire going on along the beach. As soon as the clam opened up, it was ready to eat.

Cooking clams on an open fire on the beach

Illustrated by Julia Tay

My grandmother knew how to cook pufferfish, even though it was poisonous. She knew how to remove the toxic sac from it. We would eat it occasionally during the war, and miraculously, we never fell ill from it.

Coconut trees grew in our area, and every time a coconut fell, there was a rush to collect it. We would carefully dehusk the coconut - every part of it was useful. We even burned the husk to use as a mosquito repellent. The coconut milk was used to make lemak, a rich savory gravy cooked with spices.

We also raised chickens in our garden and saved their eggs for food. Eggs were incredibly precious during those times. We maintained a garden and grew our own vegetables, including chili padi. My grandmother would cook sweet potato leaves from the garden. Unfortunately, some people resorted to stealing from gardens, even from their own neighbors. My aunt once complained that her prized papaya had been stolen in the middle of the night. People were so desperate for food that they would pull up sweet potatoes, pluck the potatoes, and then bury the plant again.

Cooking chee cheong fun and chendol with tin covers

Illustrated by Julia Tay

My grandmother would make chendol (a sweet local dessert made with coconut milk) using a large biscuit tin cover. She would use a sharp nail to puncture holes into the cover. After mashing and pounding pandan leaves until they were squishy, she would add some water to create green pandan juice. Then, she'd use tapioca flour to make a warm dough, using the pandan juice to dye and flavor the dough. Placing the punctured tin cover over a pot of cold water, she'd push the dough through the cover, and it would land in the cold water as thick strips, similar to mee tai bak (a type of thick noodles). We'd eat this in coconut milk.

We also made kueh by steaming using a large biscuit tin cover over an open wok. We'd take tapioca flour and make a dough, then place the flat, thin pieces on the hot biscuit tin cover. This resulted in something resembling chee cheong fun (a steamed roll made from wide rice noodles).

Washing clothes in kerosene tins over an open fire

Illustrated by Julia Tay

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For washing clothes, we'd fill a large kerosene tin with water and boil it. We'd stack two sets of 3-4 bricks, balance the tin on the bricks, and start a fire using driftwood. Then, we'd add a bit of soap into the kerosene tin and stir the submerged clothes with a stick. That was how we managed with what we had during those difficult times.