I could not believe the gift he was presenting me with! What a wonderful man to suggest it, and he was doing it for free as well. I felt so lucky to have taken this route, to be in the dental line. This would not have happened otherwise.
My life must be picking up. The good apples had landed on my side of the fence.
Chinese New Year of the Water Rat began on Tuesday, 15 February 1972. Since 1970, when a partial ban had been imposed on fireworks, firecrackers could be let off only at designated areas. But some people defied this ban and when the police tried to intervene, they were attacked. Immediately there was a clamp-down on fireworks for the remaining days of Chinese New Year. A move began to ban the firing of firecrackers totally and by August, it became law.
“See! See!” Ah Gu, our pessimistic neighbour, exclaimed. “Gar’ment don’t allow firecrackers, right? So bad luck lah! All the Feng Shui masters are mumbling that the lack of the sound of firecrackers at Chinese New Year is not good Feng Shui. Sure got bad luck to come.”
For once, Ah Gu was spot on, though he wouldn’t know it till November.
Then we had trouble from Malaysia. Their government wanted Singapore to pay $70 million as “goodwill compensation” if we retained the acronym MSA for our national carrier. When we were part of Malaysia, our joint national carrier was called MSA. After our separation, we called our national carrier Mercury Singapore Airlines, retaining the original acronym, whilst they called theirs Malaysian Airline System, or MAS. The latter was a good Feng Shui acronym for them as mas is the short-form for emas, gold in Malay. And of course, the symbolism of gold in Asian beliefs is that it is synonymous with good luck.
Yet, Malaysia felt the need to extract the payment from Singapore. The sum they were demanding was hefty and would diminish our coffers. Instead of giving in to them, our airline chairman, J. Y. M. Pillay and his team came up with a new name and thus new acronym, Singapore International Airlines, or SIA. The new logo was that of a stylised bird which symbolised flight, in a rich yellow against a midnight-blue background. French couture designer Pierre Balmain was nominated to design the uniform. He was shrewd enough to design his own pattern of batik that was ethnic and traditional yet sleek and modern. The colour of the sky was represented in the deep blue of the fabric. He adapted the local sarong kebaya into a simple but elegant outfit that would be stylish yet comfortable for the air stewardesses to work in.
So it was that the Singapore Girl was born.
Elsewhere in the world too there was bad luck, so it could not just be attributed to the non-firing of firecrackers. Perhaps the energies of the Water Rat ruling the year had something to do with it instead. We received the tragic news via our TV. On 13 October, a chartered flight had crashed into the Andes mountain range in Argentina, South America. The small aeroplane was carrying some Rugby players from Montevideo, Uruguay, as they were to play a match in Santiago, Chile. There were 45 people on board. Whilst crossing the mountains, the weather worsened, making visibility poor. The aeroplane hit one of the peaks of the Andes at around 13,800 feet followed by another, before crashing into the thick snow. Only 27 people survived, many with injuries like broken arms and legs. The medical doctor travelling with them died. The survivors had to cope with the relentless snowy conditions and high altitude, miles away from any town, completely cut off and isolated.
We followed their fate daily on the news. Search parties from the countries involved were called off after eight days. The fact that the plane was white in colour made it impossible to detect in the snow-covered mountains. The survivors then suffered an avalanche, which claimed another eight lives. The remaining 16 were not found till 2 months later, in December. It was then that we heard about their struggle to stay alive and their horrific story. They were miles up in the Andes. They did not have any source of food in the snow-clad mountains. To get water to drink, they had to laboriously melt snow whenever the sun shone. They were all Roman Catholics but the last survivors confessed to eating the bodies of their comrades when they ran out of food. The news caused a sensation around the world. Recriminations were slung at them.
“It’s easy to judge when you’re not in their situation,” Mak said when I explained to her what had happened. “We never know what we are capable of until we are tested.”
People continued to debate the morality of the issue for months. It was the topic of conversation, not just in offices and high courts but in hawker centres and waiting rooms. What would you do if you were struggling to stay alive in extremely difficult conditions, and the only thing that could keep you alive was your deceased friend’s body?
Our own disaster took place on 21 November.
Fire engulfed Robinsons Department Store at Raffles Place, the smoke billowing black as it rose above the business district. The flames licked the roof even of the building next door to it, the Overseas Union Bank. The conflagration could be seen from afar. The Stock Exchange at Clifford House nearby had to stop trading for the day. We were given the terrible news and the details throughout the week. Nine people died, eight of whom were burnt in the lift. What a horrible way to die. They had tried to escape the fire in the store but met their end in the lift instead. But the saddest of it all was that one of the victims was a young salesgirl who was pregnant.
On the
