First, I must say that Bro Starter and Victoria are motivators for me to start this thread. We have been following Bro Starter’s thread and Victoria was very interested to know about my early life before I met her. As Bro Starter’s story was around the same era where I grew up, thère were many things he wrote that I could share with Victoria. Things like pager, Thomson Yaohan, ah Beng, ah Lian and gangs….these are things that Victoria having born and grew up in Africa will have difficulties understanding. My life before meeting Victoria is kind of messy and quite “colourful”. Victoria has suggested that I pen down for her reading pleasures as well sharing here.
I was born in the late 70s here but my early childhood was spend growing up in Chiang Mai, Thailand. My parent had went into partnership with their Thai friend (I call him uncle Surapong). I spend 4 years in Chiang Mai before coming back to Singapore in 1985 to start my primary school education.
I stayed with my aunt in Yio Chu Kang area. It was a 4-NG (those corner unit in 3-room hdb flats). I had my room while my cousin Ming has his own room by himself. Ming is more of those guai guai (good boy) type who spend most of his time studying. Me having grew up in the plantation, belong to those “ye hai Zi” (wild boy) type. I don’t like to study but luckily my parent blessed me with a quite ok brain and strong memory. I could remember things I heard, watched or read with ease and can easily recalled most things easily. Thus, I did quite ok for my primary school educations. But, I also gave my aunt and teachers a lot of headaches as I would get into fights (especially with the boys from extended class). Even though I was always outclass (the extended boys are bigger) and lose the fights, at least one of the boy would be in the same bad shape as I. In a fight, I would always target one and land all my blows on him while subjecting my body to the rest of the boys. I called it the “bloody nose” street fight. I was taught by one of the Thai plantation worker that in a fight, always focus on one enemy. Even if you lose the fight, you would earn their fear and respect that you can take down one of them. They would think twice about crossing you in future. It’s quite a good advice actually.
6 years of Primary School life comes and was gone in a flash. I did quite ok and managed to enter the express stream in one of the better Secondary School, despite the many fights and disciplinary actions that I had.
Before I start my secondary education, my parent bought a house at Yio Chu Kang area. My mum has come back to Singapore with my 2 younger sisters. They are starting their nursery and primary school education here. My dad remains in Chiang Mai although he will fly back to spend times with us.
The first three years of my secondary school days were quite normal. Go to school, study, play basketball, going to arcade centre….
There were some chio girls in my school but I was not really into girls at that time. I tried to behave a bit since my mum was back. Things starts to change when I start my Sec 4 yr.
Quote:
Originally Posted by
Starter
How come you never tell me you got Sister!!!
I wasn’t that close with them. They were born after I come back to Singapore to study. Our age gap quite big.
Why you asked? I’m sure they are not one of the girls you wrote in your threads so far. 😁
Dad is going to expand his investment in Chiang Mai. Mum has decided to go back and help him. Auntie May (my mum’s youngest sister) will be moving into our house and take care of us. Auntie May’s husband passed away a few years back and they had no child. She has always been fond of us and always come to stay with us. When mum asked her to be our guardian, she readily agree to it.
Mum left after Dec school holiday. My life starts to change soon. During the Mar school holiday, I was at one of those arcade centre with my “死党" (buddies). We were quite engrossed in playing “Street Fighters”. One of my buddy Dav was quite good at using this character “Ryu”. He has been on the winning streaks despite many challengers. In those days, whoever is good gets to keep playing and sure to attract challengers to come and try to “dethrone” him.
Among the challengers, there was this guy who keeps putting in credits to fight Dav’s character. Dav jus keep winning. Boys being boys, Dav starts to get a little over his head and starts taunting all his challengers. Some would just laughs it off but Dav’s taunting pissed this guy off.
Quote:
Originally Posted by
Starter
Dun scare me leh, you stay Yio Chu Kang somemore
That’s why I say that your story stirrs up a lot of my memories. Don’t worry, both my sis study in Cedar Girls…..unless you also have a girl from Cedar Girls? 😁
The guy walk over and give Dav a push.
“Xiao eh, Mai ga lim bei xia lang” (roughly means: smart Alex, don’t play punk with me. Note: my translation may not be so accurate)
Dav gave a push back and demanding an apology from him and paying him the credit for causing him to lose the game to the computer.
Crowds starts to gather….I try to separate the 2 of them, telling them that it’s not nice to cause a commotion here.
The guy (ah Hu; means tiger) pointed his finger at us and say that if we dare, follow him to another place to settle this.
Quote:
Originally Posted by
Starter
Aw Buay Gong!!!
That’s why I say we are in the same era and area….maybe we have cross paths before? I was quite a bad boy then (Sec 4, Poly days) 😁
We left the arcade centre and walked to the nearest garden behind the MRT station. I saw Ah Hu wave to the other 3 guys who were waiting there. Apparently, Ah Hu had arranged for the guys to wait for us there. 2 to 1, this is 1 tough fight….
Ah Hu turned around, with that smirk face and pointed his finger at us. “Now, let’s see if u fight as well as Ryu. Lim bei Ah Hu (your father Tiger) u also dare cross. Knn.”
This is one fight that I don’t think it’s possible to avoid. While I was about to say something to hopefully diffuse the hot situation and avoid a fight, one of guy decided to take a cheap shot at me. I was barely able to avoid his swing.
Knn, if it’s a fight they want, I’ll gladly accommodate. Decided that I’ll only go for Ah Hu and let my body take the rest of the punishment, I rushed forward and putting all my weight onto that punch for Ah Hu’s nose. My punch connected and Ah Hu gave a loud cry and covered his nose with both hands.
Punches and kicks landed on me….but I ignore it. Like a frenzy wolverine, I landed all my blows onto Ah Hu. Seeing me punching like a possessed mad man, the rest of the guys were stunned….
They quickly grabbed the crying Ah Hu and make a run for it. Seeing them run, my body starts to relax and the feeling of pain starts to register in my brain….
Still panting from the exhaustion, I turned to looked at Dav. He was also stunned despite there’s some bruises on his face.
“Remind me never engaged you in a fight. You fight like a possessed mad man, kind of scary.” Dav said.
“In a fight that you know you can’t win, the minimum thing you can do is to inflict maximum punishment onto 1 guy. Only this way, you would màke them think twice about crossing your path in the future. This is something I learnt and it’s quite useful to remember.” I said to Dav.
We looked at each other’s eyes and starts to laugh. Pain wrecked us. So it was a mixture of laughter and some ouch ouch….
I got a good scolding from my aunt when I reached home. After all those scolding, aunt starts to boil 2 eggs and ask my sis to bring the bottle of jambak from her room. She used the boiled and de-shelled eggs to roll over ally bruises and then apply jambak over them. While she may scold me, I know that deep in her heart, she cares deeply for me.
2 days later, we are back at the Arcade Centre. As Dav was still playing on the arcade machine, 3 guys approached us. I recognize 2 of them from the fight we had at the garden 2 days ago.
“Our tao (head, meaning their big bro) wants to meet you. Please come with us.”
Well, soldier come, general block. Water come, earth cover.(兵来将挡，水来土掩）if it comes, it comes. Dav looks at me and we just followed them out.
They led us to 3 TZR motorbike. 2 of them passed us a helmet and told us to put on and pillion ride with them. They took us to Ang Mo Kio industrial park 1. The bikes enter one of the warehouse. Parking their bikes, they led us past some heavy machineries, enter a wooden door and walk up the staircase to level 2.
We enter a room full of tables and people gambling. Walking past all those people gambling, we were led into a room at the back.