Sweet Old Memories

This was the house we stayed in for 8 years in Parit Buntar, the address, No.112 Jalan Pegawai, Parit Buntar. The house looks run down now, the picture a recent photo taken by my brother who visited his daughter, now studying in USM Engineering Faculty, located in Parit Buntar.

When we were staying there, I was studying through from Standard 2 to Form 1. Although I was very young then and although it was almost 50 years ago, I still have very vivid memories of our life there. We were all very young, the 5 of us. I remember the busiest person was my mother. She had to get up very early to prepare breakfast and to make sure we went to school on time, the bigger ones went by bicycles, the younger ones were transported by a trishaw man who got paid RM5 per month. Then she would wash the clothes and walked to the market. Those days we did not own a fridge, I remember she went to the market on a daily basis and she cooked using fire wood in the kitchen situated detached from the main house at the back. In between all her chores, she managed to keep a chicken farm of about 15-20 chickens from which we got fresh eggs for breakfast every morning and the best tasting chicken meat you can find. I think those days must have been the happiest time of her life, and perhaps mine too, young and having not a care in the world.

I treasure sweet old memories

As time goes swiftly by.

A few bring smiles of happiness

And some tears to the eye.
They all are precious in their way,

Reopening doors of old

That have been shut these many years--

What pictures they unfold!

- Carice Williams