George had fallen in love with the English countryside and nature, and so had Pansy. It resonated with her homeopathy, treating people with medicinal plants, flowers and herbs. In the wild forests, fields and hedgerows of England, she could find many healing plants—dandelion for the urinary system, hawthorn for improving blood circulation, burdock to treat skin problems and hundreds more. She was a qualified staff nurse, but when they moved to the UK, she decided to resurrect the skill she had inherited from her mother, Kim Guek, whose name meant ‘golden moon’ in Teochew, one half of their ancestry. The other half was assimilated and borrowed from Malay culture, creating their unique Peranakan heritage. Kim Guek had been good at cooking, especially her nasi ulam. She was also famed for her bunga rampay and knowledge about jamu, the Indonesian art of healing with spices and herbs. These gifts, Pansy had inherited like a treasured heirloom.
“Kalau nak jaga diri, mesti pakay jamu,” Kim Guek had said in their Peranakan patois, with her usual wisdom. “To care for your body, use jamu. Herbs and spices use the body’s innate capacity to heal itself. They’re not as intrusive as manufactured chemicals.”
George and Pansy had taken long walks in the woods, on coastal paths and hills, enjoying the outdoors and the fresh air. They felt alive when they felt themselves at one with nature. Pansy would cook some mee goreng, nasi goreng or nasi lemak to carry in their backpacks and they would picnic in the highly scented bluebell woods, amidst wild heather in the hills, or on rugged cliffs studded with yellow buttercups and white daisies overlooking the sea. In England, you can lie down safely on the grass, baring your face to the sky, blue clouds, and sunshine. This might be a bit iffy in the tropics, where you probably need to watch out for grass snakes, or red ants with their piercing and long-lasting bites. England soothed them after their tussle with bureaucrats in Singapore when their home and village were destroyed. England was a balm to their spirit and soul.
Anthony had seemed happy enough to scuttle about, trying to catch butterflies and dragonflies, chasing seagulls, crows and magpies to coerce them into taking flight. He often busied himself with taking things apart and then putting them back together, searching for their inherent form and design, from dandelions and daisies to Meccano and Lego sets. He could be an engineer but his artistic side persuaded him otherwise. The varied buildings of Great Britain, fashioned from local materials which were available a horse ride away in days of limited conveyance, made him conscious that architectural designs had to express the flavour of its locality.
Pansy had been overjoyed when she learnt that Felpham, the thatched village where the prophetic William Blake had seen his visions, was only the next village on their arc of shingled coast, and that Rudyard Kipling had lived just a little further along in East Sussex. Buoyed by the same joy when in Hampstead, she had walked the high-walled, narrow dirt path past John Keats’s home, strolling on the beautiful heath which he had walked on. Pansy loved poetry though she had no talent to write it herself. To be able to live in a country where her favourite poets had lived and penned their memorable poems was her dream came true. It was better to have the opportunity to rub shoulders with their spirit and ghost than not at all.
Anthony, however, became less enamoured with his adopted country as he got older. He felt his complexion and features set him apart and he seemed estranged from his ang moh schoolmates. In West Sussex, there were just a few Asian classmates, mostly children of those who owned the Indian, Chinese or fish-and-chips restaurants, or convenience stores. He felt he stood out in an uncomfortable way.
So he was glad, when he was eighteen, to escape to Singapore to serve his compulsory military service. National Service (NS) was a requirement that he had to fulfil to retain his citizenship. To his delight, he discovered he felt more at home there. He loved the bustling city, its efficient transport system, its cleanliness, and most of all, its sense of safety and security. Also, its culture and roots called out to him. It seemed that having been away from his native land made him the fonder of it. So he decided to return there in 1975 after NS to study architecture at the University of Singapore.
“Mum, dad, it’s much more fun for me back home lah!” he had told them on his return from his stint with the army. “I have so many cousins, uncles, aunts and grandparents. In England, you’re the only family…”
It was Anthony who at least partially repaired the estranged relationships between them and George’s parents, locating them in Singapore, searching for his maternal great-great-grandparents in Malacca, tracing his roots and putting the family tree together. His interest in heritage became an obsession which Emily put a stop to. Anthony returned to Singapore and embraced its culture readily. So, George and Pansy had to let him go.
When Anthony made his move, George considered if it was time that they too should return to their home country, but George wasn’t sure if he was ready. He heard that laws had become stricter since they left. He had become used to the liberal way of living in the UK and could not see himself coping with all the restrictions in Singapore. George
