Kuching Landmarks and my reverie..

In April 2006 I returned to Kuching for 'Chien Meng' (Chinese Old Soul's Day). I took the opportunity to record some favourite Kuching landmarks with my digital camera. These are places very near to my old home, 'a stone throw away' so to speak and each photo is infused with memories.


The St Thomas's Cathedral (oldest cathedral in Sarawak, built in 1851) is the church I was baptized in. I was a choir boy there for a number of years. Behind it is a well worn path which I used daily for more than 8 years to walk to school. The Post Office (built in 1931) with its beautiful Corinthian columns reminds me of the few anxious weeks in 1975 when I waited for the telegram from Otago University (NZ) that would bring me the invitation to study there. This was the place I had posted numerous letters and greeting cards.

Across from this Post Office is a three-storey building called the Pavilion that served as the medical headquarters during the Brooke era. Its architecture resembles that found in some buildings in the southern states in America. Next to it is a row of shop houses near the end of which was a well known bank 'Hock Hua Bank Sdn Bhd', later changed to 'Public Bank'. This bank has been relocated. Now this row of buildings is condemned to be demolished. I used to do a lot of banking for my father at the old Hock Hua Bank.

I also post a snap shot of the Sarawak River view as taken from one of the high floors at Holiday Inn. Our Blog Administrator (Francis) and I used to row along this river on a small boat with Anthony Bong. Now looking back, we were so naive and brave to have done that especially without any life jackets on. I was not even a swimmer then. During twilight, the three of us sometimes sat on the benches in a little river-side wooden pavilion (on the very site where Holiday Inn is now situated) and we would chat and joke, the world was our oyster then. And I remember the mosquitoes. They always seem to victimize me and not the others, and Anthony joked that I had royal blood.

Yian Kwan has always been a dear friend of mine since primary one in St Thomas's School. He went to NZ to study at ChristChurch University and graduated with a Masters degree. He is a Christian with a love for the Lord. Now a resident in Kazakhstan, he has given up a career as a lecturer at Asian Institute of Technology in Bangkok (more than 10 years) and now works as a humanitarian. He never fails to contact me whenever he passes through Singapore.

I post a recent snap of us taken at my home during his latest visit in January, 2006.