Return to Blogging

Yesterday, I was invited to give a talk to a group of Secondary 1 students at NJC (National Junior College), my alma mater. They were attending a seminar on Place-Writing and learning how to write essays and poems about places they remember. Although I know nothing about writing poetry, that topic was covered by two professors who came after me. My task was simply to share my experience of writing about the places that I remember.

And so I shared with the children my experience in blogging about the Singapore that I grew up in. Due to time constraint, I focused mainly on the schools I went to (click on the label “schools” in the column on the right of this page); especially NJC, seeing that I was in the pioneer batch in 1969. Gave them some details of the old campus and shared about how we had to trudge across a big field, which is today’s Nanyang Girls School, and climb 103 steps to go for lunch at the Dunearn Secondary Technical School during the first few months when our own canteen was not ready. The irony is that the ground that DSTS stood on was the very same place that today’s NJC occupy.

1981 Map of NJC and vicinity

I also shared my fondest memories of my two years in NJC. Showed them some photos of our Adventure Camp in Pulau Tekong in April 1969. Not surprisingly, the photo which most intrigued them was this one of me standing in front of a tobacco farm.

I should apologize for neglecting this blog - which had given me my much satisfaction and even a bit of fame – for so long. I haven’t blogged regularly since I discovered Facebook in 2014. Anyway, I have decided that I would try to resume my blogging here, even if it’s on a less regular basis. So do keep tuned.