Monthly Archives: July 2015

My journey continued. Five more days to go before reaching our final destination Hong Kong by way of the South China Sea. My mind is quite blank when it comes to this segment of my voyage. I could not even remember going for the 3 o’clock afternoon tea which I had enjoyed so much in the earlier part of the voyage.

The only thing I remember is that there were two young ladies joining our ship in Singapore. The two young girls were of our age and lived in Kuala Lumpur Malaysia. They had traveled by land from Kuala Lumpur a day before to catch the M V “Ruys” in Singapore. They were going to Hong Kong to enrol in a hair dresser course to become a hair stylist. Hong Kong then was that important, far ahead of Singapore, Malaysia and the other South East Asian Countries in many aspects, be it business, commerce, manufacturing, banking, fashion, culinary. But behind Japan. Sometimes I would ponder what path fate had pre-arranged for the two ladies, had they successfully completed their hair dresser course, had they gone back to Kuala Lumpur and opened a hair salon as had been their aspiration or had they somehow ended up living in Hong Kong. I will never have an answer.

With the limited knowledge that I possess, every time I hear of the South China Sea, I can only picture the great many Chinese pirates that infested these waters centuries ago. The most famous or infamous of the pirates was Zheng Yi in late 1700’s/early 1800’s, with a fleet of some 400 ships or more and 50,000 plus pirates. When he died in 1807 his wife, a former prostitute in Canton, took over. She was so ruthless, powerful and feared that the Qing Government could no longer fight her and decided to give her and most of her men an amnesty in 1810. She accepted, retired wealthy and died at the long age of 69.

Our ship entered Hong Kong water early morning February 9, 1966. The sun had already risen unlike when we arrived in Singapore. Obviously contraband activities if ever they were contemplated were out of the question under the bright day light. So there were no more James Bond clips to watch. Our ship reduced speed as it navigated through the many smaller islands that surrounded the main Island of Hong Kong. I had never seen so many islands before, some were bare, some had small houses clustered together close to the beach, all were covered with lush green vegetations. The feeling we experienced here was very different from the one we had when entering Singapore harbour. Here the atmosphere was dynamic and electrifying, the port was busy and vibrant with boats of all shapes and sizes. all hurriedly jockeying their way through the channels, mainly to deliver goods and merchandises to the many cargo ships anchored in the harbour. The most spectacular vessel was the Chinese Junk Boat with their distinctive sails.

The Junk boat is an ancient Chinese sailing ship design that is still in use today

A sampan, a relatively flat bottomed Chinese wooden boat, with The Aberdeen Floating Restaurant in Hong Kong behind

We entered the Harbour proper from the East entrance through the narrow channel at Lei Yue Mun. At that instance our ship was like a towering giant overlooking land on both sides. The left side was Hong Kong Main Island and the right side was the Kowloon Peninsula. Standing high and tall on deck I felt that I could have touched the land with my bare hand. It was an exhilarating moment for me, it was a moment of great joy in its purest form, I was on top of the world. That feeling had stayed with me for all these years and would never be lost.

My ship MV “Ruys” passed through this narrow channel at Lei Yue Mun

Our ship continued through the channel guided by two tugboats to the specific spot assigned for our ship to drop anchor. As we glided in the harbour we could see numerous numbers of buildings lining the shores on both sides of the ship. Many small vessels “Sampan” and “Junk” boats were streaming around us like water beetles in a pond busy attending to their business. We saw the world famous Star Ferry boats that plied incessantly between Hong Kong and Kowloon transporting large number of passengers. We also saw the eye catching Hong Kong & Shanghai Bank Building sitting majestically facing the Kowloon Peninsula. It did not come to mind that one day I would be working in this famous building.

This is HSBC (The Hongkong and Shanghai Banking Corporation Limited) as I first saw it in 1966. Today it has been replaced by a modern building.

Our approach was a non-event, nobody seemed to pay any attention to us. The people had seen so many liners so many times coming and going that they would rather use the extra minutes making some money than wasting time looking at us.

The M V “Ruys” dropped anchor just a little bit after noon.

The Hong Kong Harbour, commonly known as Victoria Harbour is one of the most spectacular harbours in the world.

I promised in an earlier post that I would write about my first job. After graduating from Secondary School and obtaining my Higher School Certificate, only one option was opened for me, finding my first job. I would at that time love to go to University but Mauritius had no University then. I would have to go abroad typically England for higher education but my family was unable to afford the cost.

The school system in Mauritius was the same everywhere in the British Colonies as I later found out in Hong Kong. Higher School Certificate was Form VII and School Certificate was Form V. Form V is Grade 11 and Form VII is grade 13 in Canada.

Finding a job was not an easy thing particularly an office job, recommendation and referral from some prominent persons were essential. The local newspaper did not even have a Job Search Section. Fortunately for me my younger sister was at that time being courted by a nice lad who had the good fortune of having as Godfather a Senior Government Officer. I was asked to prepare a Resume which the Godfather passed on to the Ministry of Finance under his recommendation, I was not even interviewed but if I did it was probably just to say hello. I got a job as Clerical Assistant in the “Registry” of the Ministry of Finance, hooray with a monthly salary of Rupees 200.

The Ministry of Finance was the most important Ministry just a level below the Governor and was located in the “Government House” which was the most important building on the Island. The “Registry” was located in a large room with high ceiling on the ground floor to the left. The room accommodated five staff, the Chief Registrar and four Assistants whose desks were positioned in a sort of semi circle facing the desk of the Chief Registrar. This set up was popular in the Colonial days, I saw the same set up widely used in Hong Kong establishments. The door and one window were kept open to allow fresh air through, we were glad that we had a large ceiling fan to keep us from boiling during the hot summer months. The Chief Registrar was a nice man in his late forty, a little bald on his forehead, very serious in his job, a little bit nervous at times, his name was Mr. Dosa. The clerical staff including myself was quite international in composition, one Hindu boy, one Hindu girl, one Muslim and one Chinese.

Government House just as it was when I was working there in 1965 at the Ministry of Finance

Across the room from us was another much larger room separated by a small corridor. That room accommodated six or seven Officers. Next in line on the hierarchy was the Deputy Financial Secretary, Mr. Bunwaree, an older gentleman in his fifty, with thick glasses. I thought that he must have gone through a lot of higher education than any of us under his command. He occupied a large room on his own, just like us with a large ceiling fan. The top man was the Financial Secretary, an appointee from The Foreign Office in London England. His office was somewhere on the first or second floor of the House but we dared not venture close to his office vicinity.

At that time Dr. Seewoosagur Ramgoolam was the Minister of Finance with an office down the Hallway, we did not however have a lot of interaction with his office. Dr. Ramgoolam was knighted by The Queen when I was still working in his Ministry and we all felt very proud of his Knighthood. Subsequently in 1968 he became the first Prime Minister of Mauritius when the Island gained independence from Britain.

The role of the Registry was to take care of all the correspondences coming in and going out of the Ministry of Finance. All incoming letters were personally opened by Mr. Dosa who after reading them would pass on to one of the four Clerical Assistants to record them in a large registry book. The letters were then divided among the four Assistants. Our role was to read the letter and file it in a new file or an existing file. On the cover of the file were two columns: “Date” and “Send To”. We marked the date and put the initials of the Officer who was to deal with this letter. The file was placed in an “OUT” tray on our desk. From time to time one of the “boys” who were messengers for the Ministry would clear the tray and deliver the file to the respective Officer. In the event that an Officer was unable to deal with the issue, he would pass on the file to his Superior Officer for action by again making use of the “Date” and “Send To” columns. Some important issues were sent to the Deputy Financial Secretary and the Financial Secretary as necessary. At the end of the day some files might come back to us and it was our responsibility to file and lock them away in a cabinet.

All replies from the Ministry as prepared by the Officers were sent to the “Typing Pool”. This was a large room with four or five female typists. When the letter was typed the typist would fill in the “Date” and “Send To” column on the folder cover and the file placed in the out tray for the messengers to take them away. The typing pool was quite noisy comparatively not just because the girls would be chatting at any available occasion but because of the tapping sound of the manual typewriters. So their room was quite a distance away from us.

An Olympia top of the line 1960’s typewriter at the Typing Pool. It was indeed noisy.

Certain letters were confidential and they would be handled personally by Mr. Dosa, the Clerical Assistants were not to be involved. Letters which were addressed to other Government Departments were hand delivered twice daily by our messengers, or immediately if it was of utmost urgency. Confidential letters would be sealed. It was the duty of the messengers to seal the envelope under the watchful eye of Mr. Dosa. The messengers were quite good at the task, involving melting a red wax stick and impressing the seal of the Ministry on the molten wax before it hardened.

Confidential letters were sealed by melting wax and impressing the seal over the molten wax before it hardened

There were four or five “boys” in the Ministry with a Head Boy. They did not have any serious education and were not able to read, write or speak English or French. We communicated with them in the local Creole language. They did however recognize the “Initials” of the Officers on the file cover to enable them to do their job. The boys did not have a room of their own but hanged around the corridor between our room and the Officer’s room. They did not have the luxury of a ceiling fan. There were a small desk and two chairs in the corner but except for the Head Boy none dared to sit while on duty. The boys’ job was mainly to bring files from one party to another, seal confidential letters, post letters, hand deliver documents, some personal errands for the Officers and last but not least to prepare morning and afternoon tea for the Officers precisely at 10 am and 3 pm respectively. On the corridor wall near the desk there was a series of buzzer which the Officers when requiring a boy assistance would trigger by pressing a button located under their desks.

Sometimes certain documents or files had to be sent to His Excellency The Governor whose office was in his residence at “Le Reduit” in the outskirt of town a half hour drive from Government House. Those documents and files would be placed in a metal box with lock. The box would be hand carried to the “Secretariat” office located adjacent to the Government House. The Secretariat had the duty of delivering mail to the Governor and every afternoon at a prescribed hour, the Government car would take the mail to “Le Reduit” under the escort of a Police Land Rover. At “Le Reduit” the staff held a duplicate key to open the box.

“Le Reduit” the official residence of the Governor of Mauritius. Originally built in 1749 on a 240 acres lot as a fortress, destroyed by cyclone in 1892, rebuilt and renovated

Occasionally His Excellency The Governor would pay a visit to the Financial Secretary at Government House. On these occasions we would be anxious to get a peep at the Governor, as he stepped off from his Rolls Royce, elaborately and pompously dressed in a white Military outfit with a large prominent hat with white feathers, white gloves and a sword hanging from his waist.

That was the good old days when life was simple.

This was how impressive formal and pompous the Governor was

As day broke the M V “Ruys” glided silently without fanfare into the Singapore Harbour. Things became clearer, we could now see the city of Singapore awakening, we saw lush green vegetations and some old colonial buildings which were familiar to my eyes as their structure and look were similar to many Government buildings found in Mauritius. The same blue print must have been dispatched from London to all over the British Empire.

Old Post Office Building built around 1900 in Mauritius

Old Post Office Building in Singapore built around 1900, with similarity to other Government Buildings in other parts of the British
Empire

There were a number of other cargo ships anchored in the harbour but ours was huge and imposing. I do not remember if our ship was anchored in the middle of the harbour or if it was berthed. No matter what we three young and excited Mauritian lads were eager to set foot ashore. Singapore Port Officials were soon on board, a table and some chairs were set up earlier close to the gangway for them to check the passenger’s passport and to give the stamp of approval to disembark. Yahoo off we go.

Singapore is situated at the tip of the Malay Peninsula and has an area of only 277 square miles

Singapore has an interesting history. Founded in 1819 by Sir Thomas Stamford Raffles as a trading post of the East India Company, Singapore came under British control in 1824. It gained independence from Britain in 1963 and joined Malaysia. Two years later in 1965 it was expelled from Malaysia to become a self independent country. As a rejected orphan on the bloc, Singapore had to initially struggle through life. Without natural resources and limited land base but with extraordinary determination and under great leadership, Singapore prospered. Today Singapore is one of the safest countries in the world and ranks high in standard of living, education, healthcare and economic competitiveness. It shared the title “The Four Asian Tigers” with Hong Kong, South Korea and Taiwan.

Four Asian Tigers – Taiwan Korea Singapore and Hong Kong

Singapore received world wide attention in the 1990’s when chewing gum was banned there because vandals were sticking chewing gum on the door sensors of the newly built Mass Rapid Transit, causing disruption to train services. Chewing gum is still banned today with a fine of $500.00 for spitting it on the streets. Also in 1994 there was world wide controversy when an American teenager was sentenced to canning in Singapore for vandalism using spray paint. Canning was a widely used form of legal corporal punishment in Singapore, a legacy left behind by British Colonial rule.

The name Singapore is derived from Malay meaning “Lion City”, hence the iconic Head of a Lion emblem associated with the country.

The famous Lion Head which is widely associated with Singapore

I had no idea where we would be going and what we would be visiting in Singapore, I was simply content to follow Cyril who was a tat more mature than me and Clovis and we felt pretty assured that things would turn out great. To our great surprise Cyril had earlier written to a Mauritian friend studying in Singapore, he was standing at the berth to greet us and to be our tour guide for the day.

The weather was bright and sunny, the temperature over 32% C and humidity in the 80’s and yet Singaporeans consider February their best month of the year.
I could not recall all the details of where we went and what we saw but for sure we took the bus to the city and visited the world renowned Singapore Botanical Garden, a 74 hectare garden famous for its orchid hybridization programme initiated in the late 1920’s. We were indeed impressed with the wide variety of beautiful and colourful orchids. I think somewhere we rode on a monorail something which we had never seen before.

Singapore Botanical Garden famous for its Orchids programme initiated in 1920’s

I could not remember what we had for lunch, it could not have been very exotic since we would not be able to afford it. I tend to believe that it must have been some fried rice and noodles Singapore style spicy and hot.

Singapore Fried Rice aromatic and delicious

Singapore Fried Noodles hot and spicy is world famous and a must to taste while visiting the Island

We returned on board early in the evening ready for the next phase of our journey up the South China Sea to Hong Kong.