My Childhood

Was reading my friend’s blog, and he inspired me to jot down some childhood memories. Where do I even begin? Some fond memories, some bittersweet, yet all has helped shaped me to who I am today. In no particular order, I remember:

1. having a terrible stomach ache when I was about 8. Cried my eyes out sitting on the toilet bowl, but nothing came out from the nether regions. Had my parents really worried, and was subsequently diagnosed with appendicitis.

2. puking at the backseat of my dad’s car when my parent’s sent me from my hometown to be admitted to the Kuching General Hospital (about 60+ km away on the “not so advance” roads) for the appendicitis’ operation.

3. being wheeled to the operating theatre, I saw a doctor with a needle, injecting into the drip, while saying to me, “This will help you sleep”. He started counting and I totally zoned out when it came to “3”. Never fell asleep so fast in my life. Next thing I remember, I woke up post op in the hospital bed.

4. being in the ward itself, seeing a young boy with one leg, hobbling on crutches playing tag with other children, laughing and shouting. I was curious about why he had only one leg, but did not ask any questions.

5. being showered with gifts, and most memorable, was a lego set of a petrol station from my mum, and another big lego set of a castle from my dad. How easily I was to please!

6. playing cards with the nurses with a game called “Jitpun Ta-Chan” or translated from Hakka “Japanese Fight”.

7. the time the stitches needed to be taken out, and fearing pain, I screamed all through the process fearing the worst, even though it didn’t hurt. As I came out of the doctor’s room in the hospital, I saw a lot of other patients looking at my direction, and only now realised how embarrassed my mother would have been, and how traumatised I may have made the other young patients.

8. refusing to go to a Chinese school because I couldn’t understand what the teacher was saying, and had trouble learning Chinese. The Chinese teachers were a horror, punishing students left right and centre. I lasted a week before my parents subsequently moved me to a Catholic school, resulting in me being one of the few Chinese in the whole classroom of mixed ethnicity.

9. that from Primary 1 to 2, during recess, I would play, by running around and sweat like mad. Everyday, without fail, the teacher would make me stand outside the class (together with my fellow partners in crime) to “dry” before entering the classroom after recess.

10. having to stand up all through a class in Primary 3, because the teacher asked me a question, and I couldn’t answer. Was not known to be scholarly and studious back then.

11. being told I sleep walk, although I have no recollection of actual events.

12. having my first taste of beer when I was about 7 I think, just after dinner, staggered to bed on unsteady feet and slept the whole evening and night through.

13. having to write, “machine” a hundred times because I couldn’t spell it when my mother gave me a spelling test.

14. having difficulties in school, as I couldn’t speak Malay. Had tuition, and subsequently learnt to read “BA, BE, BI, BO, BU” etc.

15. having tuition to learn some Chinese. To date, I can recognise some characters, and most notably, that my surname is not the same as the “yang mek mek”.

16. hearing my elder sister and cousins playing the piano, and pestered my parents for me to have lessons as well.

17. having to travel weekly to Kuching and back, car-pooling with other students, just to have the piano lessons because there wasn’t anyone qualified to teach music in my hometown.

18. eating the “satay on a stick”, which costs 20sen for 3 sticks, with the 20sen for a packet of noodles sold by the nuns running the school canteen.

19. whizzing through the narrow walkways along the shops in my roller skates, and jumping from a ledge to a platform separated by a drain. Luckily, no accidents from those various childish daredevil stunts.

20. my mother with the feather duster chasing me and saying “You run some more, I will give you ten strokes of the “ten tiao” instead of five!” for being naughty. My, what a handful I must have been back then.

21. reading and looking at a picture about pulling out a shaky tooth by putting a string round the tooth, and attaching the string to a door knob of an open door, and slamming the door quickly to pull the tooth out. Obviously, I was too chicken shit to try it out, even back then.

22. having a shaky right front tooth, and my grandaunty asked to see it, and before I knew what happened, she pulled my left front tooth out by mistake with her bare hands! Ouch!

23. cycling with my cousin, and collided with him while trying to avoid the rain, landed on my face, and subsequently chipped one of my front tooth.

24. returning from the post office on my yellow BMX, cycling with one hand (other hand holding the letters). Did not see a rock in front on the road, had the misfortune to do a tumble, and broke my left collar bone.

25. being in an aeroplane, and overheard a young girl a few seats in front diagonally to the right, telling her mother that the lunch was “Hot”. At that specific time, it made me think as to the difference between heat hot and chilly hot.

26. making my younger sister cry by telling her she was picked up from the rubbish bin.

27. having to venture to the deep dark “downstairs” (stayed in a shop house) to brave the dark shop lot to windup the “old clock” on the wall. Ran back up the stairs as fast as I could immediately after, with thoughts of apparitions looking at me and chasing me. Brrrrr….

28. being scared of a ferocious looking “green lion” during the Chinese New Year period. Was concerned that it would bite me if it comes too close to me. I would crouch in fear behind some shelves as it passed. Was told that if I pluck the coloured strings from the mane of the lion, it would bring me good luck! Come on! As if I would go near that “thing!”.

29. having two recurrent dreams when I was young. One was where I was trapped in a grey square horizontal/vertical like maze and couldn’t get out. I could only get out by unconsciously “shocking” myself awake by having a spasm. The other recurrent dream, was being chased by the supernatural. Strangely, I cannot remember any pleasant dreams.

30. watching an outdoor movie called “Sa-Cin” in Hakka from my cousin’s house’s balcony overlooking the bus stop area hosting the movie. It was about this Medusa-like lady with snakes for her hair.

31. some of my childhood friends and even what they look like back then; Edward, Luding, Rafi, amongst others, and wonder what or where are they now.

I have other memories, but the list could go on and on.
So, what do you remember from your childhood?