Soft launch of my book @ Peranakan Museum

This afternoon, I attended the “soft-launch” of my book, Good Morning Yesterday. I want to thank all friends who came and friends at the National Heritage Board who helped organise this event. I call this a “soft launch” because it was limited to invited friends. These are my friends from the “Friends of Yesterday.sg” (FOYers) group, as well as fellow nostalgia/heritage bloggers.



The reason I chose to do this launch with my FOYer friends is because this book has its roots in the group. I remember we had our inaugural meeting exactly 6 years ago at the nearby Moon River Restaurant. Six years passed quickly, and the movement we started that day has grown tremendously. Interest in heritage and nostalgia blogging has grown significantly and so has the number of our members. Many of us still blog regularly and we meet regularly too. And we have made many new friends, some in the cyberspace, and some from overseas.


Judging from the number of requests for assistance received by me and my friends - from students, media people, as well as tv documentary producers - I think interest in heritage and nostalgia has grown tremendously these past few years. I’d like to believe that our group played no small part. And one of those developments of course, is the publication of my book. Hence, it is appropriate that I celebrate this milestone in my career with my fellow FOYers.


As I said in my speech, today’s event itself is already an achievement for me. If my book does well in the marketplace, that is a bonus. It might even give me the confidence to venture into another similar project. Just as I had been inspired by the writers in our midst, like Dr Tan Wee Kiat and Mr Shaik Kadir, I hope that a few of our FOYer friends who are also contemplating writing a book will be encouraged by my ‘achievement’. However, I should caution them that such an undertaking does incur many many hours of disciplined hard work.


During our interaction, Shaik Kadir suggested that perhaps we could all join hands and do a joint publication. Personally I am for the idea. Perhaps NHB could assist us with some funding and coordination.


I hope you will get hold of a copy of my book and together we can take a trip down memory lane and revisit the Singapore that exists only in our memories …….. and relive the ‘Times of Your Life’.


Thank you.


PS – Check out PY’s post of this event and my book as well as Walter's thoughts here.

Thanks to Char Lee (Icemoon) for this shot of my book displayed at Times Tampines.