Roots and Leaves

When dad got his transfer order to serve in Singapore he decided that it was time that the girls get acquainted with their roots and mix with real children from the provinces. Not only were my two elder sisters and I packed off to go to school in his hometown Melaka  but we had to live in the school hostel as well. I was a mere eleven year old who had just had her birthday on Christmas Eve and a fortnight later in the new year entered Std 6 at the Durian Daun Girls' School.

This was a quaint school with a grammatically incorrect name. Shouldn't it be Daun Durian, I remember thinking but what surprised me more was that there was only one block of it. The KL school had three blocks and a hall with a stage; my immature mind wasn't too sure whether this was a proper school at all.

The school uniform comprised a green pinafore worn over a white blouse with a green bow-ribbon at the collar and a belt buckled at the waist. As if to confirm my "doubt" over the school,  I noticed that the green wasn't a standard shade but ranged from bright-apple to sombre-jungle and it was apparent that the girls' tailors were given free rein on how to sew the pleats on the skirt section. Some were arranged as in those of convent uniforms, some were box pleats, some side pleats and some simple gathers, and I shall not even mention the multiple styles of the bows or even the collars.

Later I learnt to appreciate this variety of the so-called uniforms, making the school unique in it's interpretation of the word conformance. And in the ensuing weeks I observed that a huge percentage of the school population did not come to school by car or trishaw but walked to school everyday, some from seemingly great distances. And I was one of them.

This primary school was actually the feeder school to the nearby Malacca Girls High School where my two elder sisters had been placed. It was a newish school set up to serve the locality as well as for bright young girls specially picked from the rural areas and given the opportunity to study in an urban school. These kids were also provided places in the school hostel which also took in girls from the neighbouring Malay-medium school Sekolah Tun Teja and the brand new co-ed (mixed boys and girls) lower secondary school. With a teachers training college also in the vicinity, this neighbourhood had a nice studenty atmosphere to it,  the roads each morning and afternoon filled with kids walking to their schools or going home.

Yes, from being driven everyday, this time I had to walk to school. But the distance was almost negligible and it took at most maybe 5-8 minutes, two of those were from negotiating the corridors of MGHS from the hostel before exiting through it's main gate.

One particular quirk of the Durian Daun School was the punishment for being late for Assembly on Monday mornings. There was a huge tree at the front of the school block where late-comers had to wait until the Assembly was over. I had always by then suspected it to be a durian tree that did not bear fruit - hence the name of the school. Anyway I was late on one day and after the assembly, late-comers was asked to stay behind to be issued the punishment.

It was nothing really but a friend who was also new to the school went on and on about it saying what a stupid school it was, and that at her old school in Tampin she never had to do this kind of thing. And that we were never asked our reason for being late in the first place.

The punishment was: to pick up the leaves that had fallen from the huge tree and pile them up - the duty of the school-gardener it was. Well, better than running round the field 10 times I must say, but thinking back it would have been more appropriate to call it Pungut Daun Girls' School, wouldn't it?

But the one thing I liked most studying there apart from the very friendly Melaka girls was that while I had always languished in about no. 15 in Std 4A and 5A in MGS KL, I was consistently FIRST in class Std 6B at Durian Daun! You could say I knew a long time ago how it felt to be a jaguh kampung... (this is not, I repeat NOT, a reference to our badminton team)

Back at the hostel, I was the littlest of all the penghuni - as we were known then. Where at home I had 4 little ones to play and have fun with, here I was like everyone's little sister but who still had to do her own washing and ironing. Everybody had to anyway except for one girl whose dad could afford the RM4 per month dhobi fees, which in fact was my pocket money for the month. This was the balance from the RM20 hostel fees which dad sent! And amazingly it was enough since I have no recollection of either being hungry or deprived whatsoever, only that of  being secure in a wonderful sisterly environment of anak-anak dara sunti, ah moi's and tangkachi's from the outback - and of course basking in the thought that I  was really quite "clever" there...

1965 - The puny one in the centre is me

How I've grown! By 1968 I was a member of the politburo

with Madam President cum Warden -  Bien Mei Nien 
 Me in the back row centre off-right ooops right off-centre

and my multi-racial constituency
1DORM!!!

I think Dad had made a wise decision plonking us at the hostel where our values of mutual support and togetherness were formed, where I improved tremendously in spoken and written Malay, also picked up some Mandarin, and learnt to appreciate the roots (some very humble) of each of our fellow penghuni asrama.

Form Four he decided it was time I lose my hilly-billyness and move back to KL.

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