STRAITS TIMES, 19 Iune 2010.
A love story
Love at first sight is romantic but may not hold a candle to love that lasts a lifetime & is for better or for worse
By Lee Wei Ling
An advertisement for the 'Sassy Miss 2010 Workshop Series' in The Straits Times caught my eye recently. The headline was: 'The Power of First Impressions.'
The text claimed: 'It takes just 30 seconds for your first date or prospective employer to form an everlasting impression of you. So flash your X-factor, from the way you look to the style in which you carry yourself. Come uncover all the trade secrets of image-making at this power workshop!'
I was amused. If I want to make an impression, it would be to show my competence, sincerity, pragmatism and willingness to fight for what is right. My appearance and how I carry myself are highly unlikely to make an impression in a 30-minute encounter, let alone a 30-second 'flash'.
As for assessing someone on the first encounter, it would take me at least five to 10 minutes to appraise a person. I do not base my judgment on whether the person is good-looking or how he carries himself. Instead I would focus on his facial expression and body language.
If these contradict what he says, I would be wary of him. Body language and facial expressions are rarely under voluntary control and hence are better indicators of the true intent of a person than speech.
I am fairly good at sizing up people. There have been quite a few instances when I have accurately assessed someone at the first brief encounter. But even then, I seldom depend solely on first impressions. I will reassess the person on subsequent occasions. Only if I observe certain traits repeatedly would I be confident in my assessment.
Some people do indeed judge others on the basis of first impressions. Their judgment may well be strongly influenced by the person's appearance, how well he carries himself and how eloquently he speaks. I think such people are shallow. In life, we have to interact with people; and the more accurately we judge people, the fewer mistakes we are likely to make about them.
Research on interpersonal relationships between strangers shows that physical appearance does influence first impressions. But this does not explain why people stick together in long-term relationships. Commitment is a key variable in sustaining such relationships.
The one remarkable relationship I have personally observed is the one between my father and mother. Theirs was certainly not love at first sight. Nor were looks the main factor in their mutual attraction. Rather, it was personality and intellectual compatibility.
They are not only lovers, they are also best friends. There has never been any calculation about how much each had invested in the relationship. Theirs is an unconditional love.
Before my mother suffered her first stroke in 2003, she lived her life around my father, taking care of his every need. The stroke and the resultant disability made my mother quite frail.
From that point on, my father lived his life around her. He was still in the Cabinet, first as Senior Minister and then as Minister Mentor, but he tried his best to arrange his working schedule around my mother's needs.
He also took care of her health, strongly urging her to swim daily for exercise, and supervised her complicated regime of medication. He would also measure her blood pressure several times a day, till I got in touch with Dr Ting Choon Ming who had invented a blood pressure measuring equipment that is worn like a watch. Next day, when Dr Ting came to take the watch back to analyse the recorded blood pressure, my mother said to him: 'I prefer to have my husband measure my blood pressure.'
After my mother's second stroke in 2008, she became bed-bound and could no longer accompany my father on his travels overseas or to social functions here. Every night after returning home from work, my father now spends about two hours telling my mother about his day and reading aloud her favourite poems to her.
The poetry books are rather thick and heavy, so he uses a heavy-duty music stand to place the books. One night, he was so sleepy, he fell asleep while reading to my mother, slumped forward and hit his face against the music stand. Since the music stand was made of metal, he suffered abrasions on his face. He cursed himself for his carelessness but still carries on reading aloud to my mother every night.
I have always known my father was fearless, willing to fight to the bitter end for Singapore. When Vietnam fell in 1975, it looked for a while as though the domino hypothesis - which held that other South-east Asian states would also fall to the communists like dominoes - might turn out to be true. My father knew how ruthless the communists were, but he was determined to stay on in Singapore, and my mother was just as determined to stay on by his side.
I began this article because I was reading an article in a psychological journal on 'love at first sight versus love for a lifetime, for better or for worse'.
Love at first sight is rare and often does not endure. The affection my parents have for each other is also rare. They are each other's soul mates; their happy marriage has lasted beyond their diamond anniversary.
But they have never made a show of being a loving couple in public. Even in private, they have rarely demonstrated their love for each other with hugs or kisses. It was only after my mother's second stroke that I saw my father kiss my mother on her forehead to comfort her. They don't seem to feel the need for a dramatic physical show of love.
I have great admiration for what my father has done for Singapore - and at age 87, he is still promoting Singapore's interests. But he being the first-born son in a Peranakan family, I would not have suspected him to have been capable of such devotion as he has shown for my mother, taking care of her so painstakingly. My admiration for him has increased manifold because I have watched him look after my mother so devotedly over the last two painful years.
The writer is director of the National Neuroscience Institute
Sunday, October 3, 2010
CONFIDANTE, COUNSEL AND COMPANION OF 63 YEARS
Oct 3, 2010
Confidante, counsel and companion of 63 years
Brilliant and intensely private, the late Madam Kwa Geok Choo is best remembered as Minister Mentor Lee Kuan Yew's loyal partner, whose strength of character supported him as he built a new nation
By Lee Siew Hua, Senior Writer
She was the supremely capable wife who signed the cheques and kept the family strong, prompting her husband, Minister Mentor Lee Kuan Yew, to suggest, only half in jest, that he was a 'kept man'.
Many men will cringe at that status, believing that being kept is a contemptible station in life. Not so Mr Lee, who sometimes made counter-intuitive remarks about his wife that hinted at how equal their marriage was.
Married in 1947, their union spanned the decades from Singapore's vulnerable infancy to its arrival as a First World country. Telling the nation that he was a kept man was Mr Lee's way of acknowledging how central his wife, Madam Kwa Geok Choo, a brilliant cheongsam-clad lawyer, was in his career.
Because he had a resolute, able and successful wife at his side during the riotous 1950s, he had the freedom of mind to take arms against colonialism and communism, without worrying that their three young children might suffer if anything were to happen to him.
It was years later, in 1985, that he would say in Parliament: 'Over the years I've been a kept man. My wife keeps the family.'
That was a rare moment when the role in his life played by his intensely shy and private spouse surfaced.
For she had chosen all her life to support him from behind the front line. It was not her place to offer political advice, both appeared to agree, or advance her own agenda or take a direct part in politics.
When senior Straits Times journalists, interviewing him in the late 1990s for their book Lee Kuan Yew: The Man And His Ideas, wanted to know what 'influence' Mrs Lee had on him, he responded:
'Not in political matters. In political matters, she would not know enough to tell me whether this is right or wrong.'
Tellingly, though, he indicated that she was a discerning judge of character.
Other times, he valued her frugality and staid quality. 'She's a very caring person, very staid, very caring; she's not frivolous and does not like to socialise, which saves a lot of time,' he said.
Trusted intermediary
Mr and Mrs Lee, together with Mr Lee's brother Kim Yew, set up the Lee & Lee law firm in a shabby Malacca Street shophouse in 1955.
It was there that Mrs Lee, or Choo as her husband called her, 'first personified the whole hazardous balancing act that was to decide the fate of Singapore', according to the late British journalist Dennis Bloodworth, who authored The Tiger And The Trojan Horse.
There, under the radar, she played the unlikely role of 'cut-out' or trusted intermediary between Mr Lee and two irreconcilable enemies - the British Governor and the 'Plenipotentiary' of the Malayan Communist Party.
Governor William Goode would make contact with Mr Lee, leader of the radical People's Action Party (PAP), through his confidential secretary Pamela Hickley, who would phone Mrs Lee and communicate in hushed tones.
As for 'The Plen', Mr Fang Chuang Pi, he did not trust telephones. But Lee & Lee's clients then included petty gangsters, unlicensed hawkers and a whole host of other humble people, so it was easy for The Plen's courier to slip upstairs to her office.
As Mrs Lee drily pointed out to Mr Bloodworth: 'A four-digit lottery runner would look much the same as a communist agent.'
Mr Bloodworth was able to consult her in the early 1980s for his rich account of the duel between the non-communist PAP and communists. Her voice as it emerged in brief quotes in the book sounded coolly cogent and eloquent, hinting at a precise, lawyerly wit.
The same voice was also evident in the odd e-mail interviews she gave the media in her later years.
For example, when asked if she and Mr Lee had disagreements, she responded: 'Would you believe me if I say we never disagree or quarrel?
'Fortunately, these are over little matters. Kuan Yew leaves household decisions to me. Family matters have not been a problem.'
Another time, in a light-hearted sequence when Radio Television Hong Kong quizzed the couple in 2002, she teased Mr Lee. The interviewer, who started by asking them if they held hands, wondered about changes since their romantic Cambridge years.
Mrs Lee gave a deliberately plain reply: 'The only change is that we've grown older.'
Cheekily, the interviewer said: 'Black hair to white hair.'
Mrs Lee, who often banters with her husband, looked at him and quipped: 'Black hair to no hair.'
Nixon's compliment
In 1973, then United States President Richard Nixon paid artful homage to her at the White House:
'Tonight, when you saw me turning to Mrs Lee, I said, 'Mrs Lee, tell me, is it true that you were No. 1 in the class at Cambridge Law School and your husband was No. 2?' And she said, 'Mr President, do you think he would have married me if that were the case?'
'But I probed further, and I found that, as a matter of fact, Mrs Lee... did receive a first at Cambridge Law School.
'Her husband did also, but like a very loyal wife, she said, 'He had a first with a star after his name, and that is something very special'.'
Mrs Lee was being modest, for she had outshone her husband academically - not at Cambridge but earlier, at Raffles College.
As Mr Lee related in his memoirs, The Singapore Story, he was the best student in mathematics, scoring over 90 marks.
'But to my horror, I discovered I was not the best in either English or economics. I was in second place, way behind a certain Miss Kwa Geok Choo.'
He sat up. 'I knew I would face stiff competition for the Queen's Scholarship,' he wrote.
They had first met at Raffles Institution. As the only girl in a boys' school, the principal had asked her to present the prizes in 1939, and he collected three books from her.
Their intellectual rivalry turned into friendship - and then love.
Her Prince Charming
The war from 1943 to 1946 disrupted their education. Together with Mr Yong Nyuk Lin, later a minister, whose wife was Miss Kwa's sister, Mr Lee started a small business making gum, which was then in short supply. The young Kuan Yew reconnected with Geok Choo in that context.
Later, he recalled: 'She told me... she was looking for her Prince Charming. I turned up, not on a white horse but a bicycle with solid tyres!'
It was often in his happy recollection of their love story - from his moonlight proposal to their secret wedding in 1947 while they were law students in Cambridge - that Mr Lee's forceful personality seemed to soften, even sparkle, most.
But then Mrs Lee regularly revealed a different side of the leader simply by her presence, or her well-timed words in a light British accent.
One day, for a Straits Times report to highlight healthy living, he hopped onto a bicycle on the Istana grounds.
The photographer and journalist found it awkward to instruct the leader of the land to keep cycling. Mrs Lee stepped to the fore, urging her husband to continue riding in circles until the photo shoot was complete.
In the public mind, however, she was very much the silent partner. 'I walk two steps behind my husband like a good Asian wife,' she said in 1976 on a visit to Kuala Lumpur. 'I am not used to interviews. I suppose I am interview-shy.'
In 1971, the Manila Times marvelled at the way the Lees kept out of the public eye. Mr Lee made sure there was 'no Lee Kuan Yew family with a capital F' and 'no Lee Kuan Yew cult', the paper said in a front-page story. And Mrs Lee was 'almost an invisible entity', the paper observed - in marked contrast to some first ladies elsewhere, including in the Philippines itself.
In this respect, she personified - and in many ways, set the model for - the Singapore-style political spouse: in the background, not a newsmaker, not flashy. She was always very quiet by Mr Lee's side in public. And by her manner and deportment, she set the moral tone for all the other political wives. Which was not to say she wasn't always observant - of situations as well as of people.
Mr Lee paid a glowing tribute to his wife in the preface to the first volume of his memoirs, The Singapore Story, which was dedicated to 'Choo':
'Choo was a tower of strength, giving me constant emotional and intellectual support,' he wrote. She would stay up with him till 4am while he laboured over his tome. 'A powerful critic and helper', she went over every word. 'We had endless arguments,' he wrote.
This was an echo of his early political life, when she used to polish his speeches because he had no time.
More significantly, she also had a hand in the 1965 Separation Agreement with Malaysia drafted by then Law Minister Eddie Barker.
Mr Lee had wanted the critical water agreements with Johor to be included in the Separation Agreement. He recounted in his memoirs: 'I was too hard-pressed, and told Choo, who was a good conveyancing lawyer, to find a neat way to achieve this.'
The paragraphs she drafted later became part of the Malaysian Constitution, guaranteeing Singapore's water supply from Johor.
The couple were inseparable. One evocative photograph that has appeared in this paper shows Mrs Lee watching and listening to her husband from a private coign on a rooftop, as he spoke at Fullerton Square rally during the 1984 General Election.
Even after her first stroke in 2003, which occurred while she and her husband were in London, she would still accompany him on trips - whether it was to Chinese New Year dinners in his Tanjong Pagar constituency or on long visits to the Middle East.
At every turn of their marriage of 63 years and in the nation's life of over 45 years, Mrs Lee's love for the father of modern Singapore ran like a leitmotif in his and the nation's life.
In the end, her life, so quiet and yet so entwined with his, made her a vital partner in the Singapore story.
siewhua@sph.com.sg
________________________________________
ABOUT MRS LEE
Madam Kwa Geok Choo was born in Singapore on Dec 21, 1920. Her parents were Mr and Mrs Kwa Siew Tee. Her father was the Oversea-Chinese Banking Corporation's (OCBC Bank) general manager from 1935 to 1945.
1936: Completes secondary education at Methodist Girls' School. First in the Senior Cambridge Examination for the whole of Malaya.
1937-39: Joins Raffles Institution Special Class, where she meets Mr Lee Kuan Yew.
1940-46: Enrols in Raffles College in 1940 and returns in 1946 after end of World War II.
1947: Graduates from Raffles College with First Class Diploma in Arts, winning the Queen's Scholarship.
1947-49: Reads law as a second-year student in Girton College, Cambridge University.
Places first in Part II of the Law Tripos - the first woman in Malaya to win this distinction.
1947: Secretly marries Mr Lee in December.
1950: Passes Bar final in May. Both she and Mr Lee are called to the Bar at the Middle Temple on June 21. Returns to Singapore. Marries Mr Lee again on Sept 30.
1951: Is admitted to the Bar in Singapore on Aug 7. Joins and becomes senior partner of a local law firm.
1952: Gives birth to son Lee Hsien Loong.
1955: The Lee & Lee law firm is established by Mr Lee, his brother Kim Yew and Madam Kwa.
1955: Gives birth to daughter Lee Wei Ling.
1957: Gives birth to second son Lee Hsien Yang.
1959: Mr Lee Kuan Yew is elected Prime Minister of Singapore. His brother and Madam Kwa take over the reins of Lee & Lee. They remain as consultants even after retirement from active practice.
1965: Helps in drafting parts of the Separation Agreement when Singapore leaves Malaysia.
2003: Suffers a stroke in October while on a visit to London. Recovers soon after and continues to accompany her husband on official trips.
2008: Suffers two strokes in May and in June, which leave her unable to get out of bed, move or speak.
2010: Dies at age 89, 11 weeks before her 90th birthday.
Confidante, counsel and companion of 63 years
Brilliant and intensely private, the late Madam Kwa Geok Choo is best remembered as Minister Mentor Lee Kuan Yew's loyal partner, whose strength of character supported him as he built a new nation
By Lee Siew Hua, Senior Writer
She was the supremely capable wife who signed the cheques and kept the family strong, prompting her husband, Minister Mentor Lee Kuan Yew, to suggest, only half in jest, that he was a 'kept man'.
Many men will cringe at that status, believing that being kept is a contemptible station in life. Not so Mr Lee, who sometimes made counter-intuitive remarks about his wife that hinted at how equal their marriage was.
Married in 1947, their union spanned the decades from Singapore's vulnerable infancy to its arrival as a First World country. Telling the nation that he was a kept man was Mr Lee's way of acknowledging how central his wife, Madam Kwa Geok Choo, a brilliant cheongsam-clad lawyer, was in his career.
Because he had a resolute, able and successful wife at his side during the riotous 1950s, he had the freedom of mind to take arms against colonialism and communism, without worrying that their three young children might suffer if anything were to happen to him.
It was years later, in 1985, that he would say in Parliament: 'Over the years I've been a kept man. My wife keeps the family.'
That was a rare moment when the role in his life played by his intensely shy and private spouse surfaced.
For she had chosen all her life to support him from behind the front line. It was not her place to offer political advice, both appeared to agree, or advance her own agenda or take a direct part in politics.
When senior Straits Times journalists, interviewing him in the late 1990s for their book Lee Kuan Yew: The Man And His Ideas, wanted to know what 'influence' Mrs Lee had on him, he responded:
'Not in political matters. In political matters, she would not know enough to tell me whether this is right or wrong.'
Tellingly, though, he indicated that she was a discerning judge of character.
Other times, he valued her frugality and staid quality. 'She's a very caring person, very staid, very caring; she's not frivolous and does not like to socialise, which saves a lot of time,' he said.
Trusted intermediary
Mr and Mrs Lee, together with Mr Lee's brother Kim Yew, set up the Lee & Lee law firm in a shabby Malacca Street shophouse in 1955.
It was there that Mrs Lee, or Choo as her husband called her, 'first personified the whole hazardous balancing act that was to decide the fate of Singapore', according to the late British journalist Dennis Bloodworth, who authored The Tiger And The Trojan Horse.
There, under the radar, she played the unlikely role of 'cut-out' or trusted intermediary between Mr Lee and two irreconcilable enemies - the British Governor and the 'Plenipotentiary' of the Malayan Communist Party.
Governor William Goode would make contact with Mr Lee, leader of the radical People's Action Party (PAP), through his confidential secretary Pamela Hickley, who would phone Mrs Lee and communicate in hushed tones.
As for 'The Plen', Mr Fang Chuang Pi, he did not trust telephones. But Lee & Lee's clients then included petty gangsters, unlicensed hawkers and a whole host of other humble people, so it was easy for The Plen's courier to slip upstairs to her office.
As Mrs Lee drily pointed out to Mr Bloodworth: 'A four-digit lottery runner would look much the same as a communist agent.'
Mr Bloodworth was able to consult her in the early 1980s for his rich account of the duel between the non-communist PAP and communists. Her voice as it emerged in brief quotes in the book sounded coolly cogent and eloquent, hinting at a precise, lawyerly wit.
The same voice was also evident in the odd e-mail interviews she gave the media in her later years.
For example, when asked if she and Mr Lee had disagreements, she responded: 'Would you believe me if I say we never disagree or quarrel?
'Fortunately, these are over little matters. Kuan Yew leaves household decisions to me. Family matters have not been a problem.'
Another time, in a light-hearted sequence when Radio Television Hong Kong quizzed the couple in 2002, she teased Mr Lee. The interviewer, who started by asking them if they held hands, wondered about changes since their romantic Cambridge years.
Mrs Lee gave a deliberately plain reply: 'The only change is that we've grown older.'
Cheekily, the interviewer said: 'Black hair to white hair.'
Mrs Lee, who often banters with her husband, looked at him and quipped: 'Black hair to no hair.'
Nixon's compliment
In 1973, then United States President Richard Nixon paid artful homage to her at the White House:
'Tonight, when you saw me turning to Mrs Lee, I said, 'Mrs Lee, tell me, is it true that you were No. 1 in the class at Cambridge Law School and your husband was No. 2?' And she said, 'Mr President, do you think he would have married me if that were the case?'
'But I probed further, and I found that, as a matter of fact, Mrs Lee... did receive a first at Cambridge Law School.
'Her husband did also, but like a very loyal wife, she said, 'He had a first with a star after his name, and that is something very special'.'
Mrs Lee was being modest, for she had outshone her husband academically - not at Cambridge but earlier, at Raffles College.
As Mr Lee related in his memoirs, The Singapore Story, he was the best student in mathematics, scoring over 90 marks.
'But to my horror, I discovered I was not the best in either English or economics. I was in second place, way behind a certain Miss Kwa Geok Choo.'
He sat up. 'I knew I would face stiff competition for the Queen's Scholarship,' he wrote.
They had first met at Raffles Institution. As the only girl in a boys' school, the principal had asked her to present the prizes in 1939, and he collected three books from her.
Their intellectual rivalry turned into friendship - and then love.
Her Prince Charming
The war from 1943 to 1946 disrupted their education. Together with Mr Yong Nyuk Lin, later a minister, whose wife was Miss Kwa's sister, Mr Lee started a small business making gum, which was then in short supply. The young Kuan Yew reconnected with Geok Choo in that context.
Later, he recalled: 'She told me... she was looking for her Prince Charming. I turned up, not on a white horse but a bicycle with solid tyres!'
It was often in his happy recollection of their love story - from his moonlight proposal to their secret wedding in 1947 while they were law students in Cambridge - that Mr Lee's forceful personality seemed to soften, even sparkle, most.
But then Mrs Lee regularly revealed a different side of the leader simply by her presence, or her well-timed words in a light British accent.
One day, for a Straits Times report to highlight healthy living, he hopped onto a bicycle on the Istana grounds.
The photographer and journalist found it awkward to instruct the leader of the land to keep cycling. Mrs Lee stepped to the fore, urging her husband to continue riding in circles until the photo shoot was complete.
In the public mind, however, she was very much the silent partner. 'I walk two steps behind my husband like a good Asian wife,' she said in 1976 on a visit to Kuala Lumpur. 'I am not used to interviews. I suppose I am interview-shy.'
In 1971, the Manila Times marvelled at the way the Lees kept out of the public eye. Mr Lee made sure there was 'no Lee Kuan Yew family with a capital F' and 'no Lee Kuan Yew cult', the paper said in a front-page story. And Mrs Lee was 'almost an invisible entity', the paper observed - in marked contrast to some first ladies elsewhere, including in the Philippines itself.
In this respect, she personified - and in many ways, set the model for - the Singapore-style political spouse: in the background, not a newsmaker, not flashy. She was always very quiet by Mr Lee's side in public. And by her manner and deportment, she set the moral tone for all the other political wives. Which was not to say she wasn't always observant - of situations as well as of people.
Mr Lee paid a glowing tribute to his wife in the preface to the first volume of his memoirs, The Singapore Story, which was dedicated to 'Choo':
'Choo was a tower of strength, giving me constant emotional and intellectual support,' he wrote. She would stay up with him till 4am while he laboured over his tome. 'A powerful critic and helper', she went over every word. 'We had endless arguments,' he wrote.
This was an echo of his early political life, when she used to polish his speeches because he had no time.
More significantly, she also had a hand in the 1965 Separation Agreement with Malaysia drafted by then Law Minister Eddie Barker.
Mr Lee had wanted the critical water agreements with Johor to be included in the Separation Agreement. He recounted in his memoirs: 'I was too hard-pressed, and told Choo, who was a good conveyancing lawyer, to find a neat way to achieve this.'
The paragraphs she drafted later became part of the Malaysian Constitution, guaranteeing Singapore's water supply from Johor.
The couple were inseparable. One evocative photograph that has appeared in this paper shows Mrs Lee watching and listening to her husband from a private coign on a rooftop, as he spoke at Fullerton Square rally during the 1984 General Election.
Even after her first stroke in 2003, which occurred while she and her husband were in London, she would still accompany him on trips - whether it was to Chinese New Year dinners in his Tanjong Pagar constituency or on long visits to the Middle East.
At every turn of their marriage of 63 years and in the nation's life of over 45 years, Mrs Lee's love for the father of modern Singapore ran like a leitmotif in his and the nation's life.
In the end, her life, so quiet and yet so entwined with his, made her a vital partner in the Singapore story.
siewhua@sph.com.sg
________________________________________
ABOUT MRS LEE
Madam Kwa Geok Choo was born in Singapore on Dec 21, 1920. Her parents were Mr and Mrs Kwa Siew Tee. Her father was the Oversea-Chinese Banking Corporation's (OCBC Bank) general manager from 1935 to 1945.
1936: Completes secondary education at Methodist Girls' School. First in the Senior Cambridge Examination for the whole of Malaya.
1937-39: Joins Raffles Institution Special Class, where she meets Mr Lee Kuan Yew.
1940-46: Enrols in Raffles College in 1940 and returns in 1946 after end of World War II.
1947: Graduates from Raffles College with First Class Diploma in Arts, winning the Queen's Scholarship.
1947-49: Reads law as a second-year student in Girton College, Cambridge University.
Places first in Part II of the Law Tripos - the first woman in Malaya to win this distinction.
1947: Secretly marries Mr Lee in December.
1950: Passes Bar final in May. Both she and Mr Lee are called to the Bar at the Middle Temple on June 21. Returns to Singapore. Marries Mr Lee again on Sept 30.
1951: Is admitted to the Bar in Singapore on Aug 7. Joins and becomes senior partner of a local law firm.
1952: Gives birth to son Lee Hsien Loong.
1955: The Lee & Lee law firm is established by Mr Lee, his brother Kim Yew and Madam Kwa.
1955: Gives birth to daughter Lee Wei Ling.
1957: Gives birth to second son Lee Hsien Yang.
1959: Mr Lee Kuan Yew is elected Prime Minister of Singapore. His brother and Madam Kwa take over the reins of Lee & Lee. They remain as consultants even after retirement from active practice.
1965: Helps in drafting parts of the Separation Agreement when Singapore leaves Malaysia.
2003: Suffers a stroke in October while on a visit to London. Recovers soon after and continues to accompany her husband on official trips.
2008: Suffers two strokes in May and in June, which leave her unable to get out of bed, move or speak.
2010: Dies at age 89, 11 weeks before her 90th birthday.
DIFFICULT TO ACCEPT A LOVED ONE'S SUFFERING
Aug 29, 2010 , STRAITS TIMES
Difficult to accept a loved one's suffering
Feeling compassion with a detachment is wise, but tough when it comes to Mama
By Lee Wei Ling
The writer, then 19, with her mother and father in Rajasthan, India. Those were happier times before her mother suffered a stroke in May 2008 and became bedbound. -- PHOTO: COURTESY OF LEE WEI LING
I awoke with a start, a while ago, from a dream. I looked at my watch. It was 4am.
It was a dream worth remembering, so I decided to write it down immediately. If I had not done so, I would not have been able to remember it later.
In my dream, I seemed to be simultaneously at home and outdoors at some unfamiliar place. Suddenly, a monster appeared and attacked me. I struggled with the monster but it matched me strength for strength. I did not utter a sound, nor was I frightened. Instead, I wrestled silently with it.
Suddenly my mother appeared. She walked towards us, but did not say anything either. Instead, she made a dismissive gesture and the monster turned tail and ran away.
That would be Mama's way of tackling problems, I thought: no need for unnecessary words or actions; just do things quietly and effectively.
At that point, I woke up. I got up from the floor where I was sleeping and went into my mother's room to see how she was doing. She was sleeping peacefully. I am now back in my room recording what I can still remember of my dream - for a 'dream' indeed it was, as it cannot be classified as a nightmare.
For two years and three months already, my mother has been too weak to get out of bed. But in that brief moment in my dream, I saw her again as she had been - physically normal.
I wished I could have dreamt on, and after some time, together with Mama, vanquished the monster in the dream and then walked off together.
In dreams, everything seems possible. That my mother appeared magically in my dream did not surprise me - either while I was dreaming or when I awoke. This is because between Mama and me, there was always some form of telepathy.
Once, when I was staying with my brother Hsien Loong, my toothbrush was worn out and needed to be replaced. I hardly ever shop, so I did what I had always done before: I told Mama I needed a new toothbrush.
Since we were in different houses and I did not want to wake her if she was sleeping by calling her on the telephone, I e-mailed her: 'Ma, I need a toothbrush.'
She e-mailed back: 'I am telepathic. I just got a toothbrush for you. But one day, the commissariat will not be around. If you don't know the word 'commissariat' go look it up in the dictionary.'
She was correct: I did not know what the word meant. And since I did not know where the dictionary was kept in my brother's house, that evening at dinner, I asked him what the word meant.
He knew, of course. 'Commissariat', he explained, is a department in the army charged with providing provisions to soldiers.
Now Mama is no longer in a position to be my commissariat. Worse yet, she is bedbound and no longer able to read - a favourite activity of hers.
Mama had wide interests. She knew things that even many highly educated people would not know or be interested in, as would be obvious if one rummaged through her bookshelves, as I did recently.
There were several books on the flora and fauna of Singapore. There was a hardcover book of children's nursery rhymes, which she had used to read to her grandchildren. Of all her grandchildren, my albino nephew enjoyed reading the nursery rhymes with her the most.
There were several books on Buddhism and Hinduism. There was a King James version of the Bible printed in a large font so that she could read it even without her reading glasses. There were many books on the Indian caste system, and a book describing the ancient city of Harappa in the Indus valley. The city dates back about 4,600 years ago, and was an important trade centre in the ancient world.
Mama was interested in the Silk Route long before it became a fashionable subject of interest. She had a book chronicling the travels of a Victorian lady on the Silk Route.
There were six Malay kamus, or dictionaries. There was a book on Chinese customs and symbols. And of course, there were many books of poetry, including a collection of Rudyard Kipling's poems.
There were also books relating to the early days of Singapore, including The Battle For Merger, a collection of radio talks my father delivered in 1961, detailing the early history of the People's Action Party's struggles with the communists. It is now out of print.
There were many books, too, written by others about my father, including Lee Kuan Yew In His Own Words, excerpts of his speeches from 1959 to 1970, edited by S.J. Rodringuez.
Mama also had the kinds of books one would expect to find on the bookshelves of someone so cultured: among other things, The Tale Of Genji, Ruth Benedict's The Chrysanthemum And The Sword, Etsu Inagaki Sugimoto's The Daughter Of A Samurai, the novels of Jane Austen, and a book I enjoyed tremendously as a child, Anne Of Green Gables.
Mama didn't just collect these books, she read them.
It is now 5.30am. I popped into her room again a while ago and she was still sleeping. I comforted myself that at least when she was sleeping, she was unaware of her unfortunate situation.
Now I am trying to go back to sleep myself, but I cannot do so - not because of the dream but because of Mama's unhappy predicament. It is acutely felt by her three children, my two sisters-in-law, and my cousin Kwa Kim Li, who is my mother's favourite niece. But the one who has been hurting the most, and is yet carrying on stoically, is my father.
It is easy when thinking in the abstract, to conclude that being born, growing old, falling sick and eventually dying is what happens to all of us. I accept these facts with no resentment that life is unkind. I have had more than my fair share of bad luck, but I never resented it, for I think suffering built up my resilience.
But I find it difficult to accept my mother's suffering. The Buddhist principle of feeling compassion but with detachment is wise, but it is not an attitude that I find humanly possible to adopt when it comes to Mama. I cannot see her suffering with detachment.
But there is nothing I can do to get her back to where she was before she suffered a massive stroke on May 12, 2008. She has been suffering since then, and so has my father. But that is life, and we all plod on, fulfilling our duties as best we can. Indeed by focusing my mind on my duties, I manage to temporarily block Mama's suffering from my consciousness.
The writer is director of the National Neuroscience Institute.
Difficult to accept a loved one's suffering
Feeling compassion with a detachment is wise, but tough when it comes to Mama
By Lee Wei Ling
The writer, then 19, with her mother and father in Rajasthan, India. Those were happier times before her mother suffered a stroke in May 2008 and became bedbound. -- PHOTO: COURTESY OF LEE WEI LING
I awoke with a start, a while ago, from a dream. I looked at my watch. It was 4am.
It was a dream worth remembering, so I decided to write it down immediately. If I had not done so, I would not have been able to remember it later.
In my dream, I seemed to be simultaneously at home and outdoors at some unfamiliar place. Suddenly, a monster appeared and attacked me. I struggled with the monster but it matched me strength for strength. I did not utter a sound, nor was I frightened. Instead, I wrestled silently with it.
Suddenly my mother appeared. She walked towards us, but did not say anything either. Instead, she made a dismissive gesture and the monster turned tail and ran away.
That would be Mama's way of tackling problems, I thought: no need for unnecessary words or actions; just do things quietly and effectively.
At that point, I woke up. I got up from the floor where I was sleeping and went into my mother's room to see how she was doing. She was sleeping peacefully. I am now back in my room recording what I can still remember of my dream - for a 'dream' indeed it was, as it cannot be classified as a nightmare.
For two years and three months already, my mother has been too weak to get out of bed. But in that brief moment in my dream, I saw her again as she had been - physically normal.
I wished I could have dreamt on, and after some time, together with Mama, vanquished the monster in the dream and then walked off together.
In dreams, everything seems possible. That my mother appeared magically in my dream did not surprise me - either while I was dreaming or when I awoke. This is because between Mama and me, there was always some form of telepathy.
Once, when I was staying with my brother Hsien Loong, my toothbrush was worn out and needed to be replaced. I hardly ever shop, so I did what I had always done before: I told Mama I needed a new toothbrush.
Since we were in different houses and I did not want to wake her if she was sleeping by calling her on the telephone, I e-mailed her: 'Ma, I need a toothbrush.'
She e-mailed back: 'I am telepathic. I just got a toothbrush for you. But one day, the commissariat will not be around. If you don't know the word 'commissariat' go look it up in the dictionary.'
She was correct: I did not know what the word meant. And since I did not know where the dictionary was kept in my brother's house, that evening at dinner, I asked him what the word meant.
He knew, of course. 'Commissariat', he explained, is a department in the army charged with providing provisions to soldiers.
Now Mama is no longer in a position to be my commissariat. Worse yet, she is bedbound and no longer able to read - a favourite activity of hers.
Mama had wide interests. She knew things that even many highly educated people would not know or be interested in, as would be obvious if one rummaged through her bookshelves, as I did recently.
There were several books on the flora and fauna of Singapore. There was a hardcover book of children's nursery rhymes, which she had used to read to her grandchildren. Of all her grandchildren, my albino nephew enjoyed reading the nursery rhymes with her the most.
There were several books on Buddhism and Hinduism. There was a King James version of the Bible printed in a large font so that she could read it even without her reading glasses. There were many books on the Indian caste system, and a book describing the ancient city of Harappa in the Indus valley. The city dates back about 4,600 years ago, and was an important trade centre in the ancient world.
Mama was interested in the Silk Route long before it became a fashionable subject of interest. She had a book chronicling the travels of a Victorian lady on the Silk Route.
There were six Malay kamus, or dictionaries. There was a book on Chinese customs and symbols. And of course, there were many books of poetry, including a collection of Rudyard Kipling's poems.
There were also books relating to the early days of Singapore, including The Battle For Merger, a collection of radio talks my father delivered in 1961, detailing the early history of the People's Action Party's struggles with the communists. It is now out of print.
There were many books, too, written by others about my father, including Lee Kuan Yew In His Own Words, excerpts of his speeches from 1959 to 1970, edited by S.J. Rodringuez.
Mama also had the kinds of books one would expect to find on the bookshelves of someone so cultured: among other things, The Tale Of Genji, Ruth Benedict's The Chrysanthemum And The Sword, Etsu Inagaki Sugimoto's The Daughter Of A Samurai, the novels of Jane Austen, and a book I enjoyed tremendously as a child, Anne Of Green Gables.
Mama didn't just collect these books, she read them.
It is now 5.30am. I popped into her room again a while ago and she was still sleeping. I comforted myself that at least when she was sleeping, she was unaware of her unfortunate situation.
Now I am trying to go back to sleep myself, but I cannot do so - not because of the dream but because of Mama's unhappy predicament. It is acutely felt by her three children, my two sisters-in-law, and my cousin Kwa Kim Li, who is my mother's favourite niece. But the one who has been hurting the most, and is yet carrying on stoically, is my father.
It is easy when thinking in the abstract, to conclude that being born, growing old, falling sick and eventually dying is what happens to all of us. I accept these facts with no resentment that life is unkind. I have had more than my fair share of bad luck, but I never resented it, for I think suffering built up my resilience.
But I find it difficult to accept my mother's suffering. The Buddhist principle of feeling compassion but with detachment is wise, but it is not an attitude that I find humanly possible to adopt when it comes to Mama. I cannot see her suffering with detachment.
But there is nothing I can do to get her back to where she was before she suffered a massive stroke on May 12, 2008. She has been suffering since then, and so has my father. But that is life, and we all plod on, fulfilling our duties as best we can. Indeed by focusing my mind on my duties, I manage to temporarily block Mama's suffering from my consciousness.
The writer is director of the National Neuroscience Institute.
Devoted Mother
Oct 3, 2010
Devoted mother
Mrs Lee raised her children to be well-mannered and disciplined, and took pride in their achievements
To the country, she was Mrs lee. To her husband, she was Choo
To her three children, she was Mama - who corrected their English, took time off from work to lunch with them every day, occasionally wielded a cane, and continued to look out for them when they were adults, down to replacing her daughter's toothbrush when it was worn out.
She took Hsien Yang, now 53 and chairman of Fraser & Neave, out to the beach, watching over him like a hawk as he built sandcastles.
She bought clothes for Wei Ling, now 55 and director of the National Neuroscience Institute, as the latter was a 'reluctant dresser'.
And when her eldest son, Hsien Loong, now 58 and the Prime Minister of Singapore, was diagnosed with lymphoma in 1992, she agonised as only a mother could.
With a mother's telepathy, she knew instinctively when her children were in trouble.
Dr Lee Wei Ling, in a column for The Sunday Times, wrote of how in 1995 she had called home after a brush with death on a hiking holiday in New Zealand, but without intending to tell her parents what had happened.
Her mother nevertheless sensed instinctively that something had happened - 'but I'd rather not know what', she told a relative.
Wrote Dr Lee: 'My mother knew me better than I knew myself.'
By accounts, Mrs Lee practised tough love when the children were growing up, making sure that they never threw their weight around although they were the offspring of the prime minister.
When the need called for it, she did not spare the rod 'when the children were particularly naughty or disobedient', recounted Minister Mentor Lee Kuan Yew in his memoirs.
'She brought them up well-mannered and self-disciplined,' he wrote.
As the family's main breadwinner during the early days of MM Lee's foray into politics, she worked long hours at the law firm she had co-founded with MM Lee and his brother, but would forego business lunches so as to be with the children.
In the evenings, she would take them to 'run around the Istana grounds while Kuan Yew played golf or practised on the practice tee and the putting green', she recalled in an interview with The Straits Times. 'And I remember taking them along to PAP picnics, and to Pulau Ubin to visit the Outward Bound School.'
For holidays, the family would visit the Cameron Highlands or Fraser's Hill in Malaysia at least once or twice a year - up to 1965. After that, they would vacation in Changi.
She took quiet pride in the children's achievements.
For instance, when Dr Lee had essays published in the Chinese newspapers, she would cut them out and paste them neatly in an exercise book.
Educated in Chinese-medium schools, their command of English is her achievement. A voracious reader with a passion for literature, she corrected their grammatical errors.
But the couple left it to the children to decide their careers, although she did dissuade Dr Lee, who was fond of dogs, against a career as a vet.
After the trio grew up, Mrs Lee's role evolved from a disciplinarian to that of confidante and companion.
In cahoots with her daughter, she persuaded Mr Lee on his 75th birthday to donate the proceeds from his book sales to polytechnic and Institute of Technical Education students instead of academically gifted students.
Her advice was often laced with her trademark humour.
Dr Lee recounted how as a by-product of being MM Lee's daughter, various people would ask to meet her though they had nothing specific to say to her.
'My mother used to say wryly of such people: 'If they cannot see the panda, the panda's daughter may be an acceptable substitute.'
She was a brilliant student and a sharp conveyancing lawyer. But it was clear that being a wife and mother were the most important roles to Mrs Lee.
In 2003, when the family auctioned for charity various personal possessions, she kept one thing: a pair of small ivory seals which she and Mr Lee had used to stamp the report cards of their three children. Another of her prized possessions was a gold pendant that Mr Lee had commissioned for her, with the engraved Chinese characters 'xian qi liang mu' (virtuous wife and caring mother) and 'nei xian wai de' (wise in looking after the family, virtuous in behaviour towards the outside world).
Dr Lee has written of how she had once e-mailed her mother when her toothbrush needed replacing. Mrs Lee e-mailed back:
'I am telepathic. I just got a toothbrush for you.
'But one day, the commissariat will not be around.'
Devoted mother
Mrs Lee raised her children to be well-mannered and disciplined, and took pride in their achievements
To the country, she was Mrs lee. To her husband, she was Choo
To her three children, she was Mama - who corrected their English, took time off from work to lunch with them every day, occasionally wielded a cane, and continued to look out for them when they were adults, down to replacing her daughter's toothbrush when it was worn out.
She took Hsien Yang, now 53 and chairman of Fraser & Neave, out to the beach, watching over him like a hawk as he built sandcastles.
She bought clothes for Wei Ling, now 55 and director of the National Neuroscience Institute, as the latter was a 'reluctant dresser'.
And when her eldest son, Hsien Loong, now 58 and the Prime Minister of Singapore, was diagnosed with lymphoma in 1992, she agonised as only a mother could.
With a mother's telepathy, she knew instinctively when her children were in trouble.
Dr Lee Wei Ling, in a column for The Sunday Times, wrote of how in 1995 she had called home after a brush with death on a hiking holiday in New Zealand, but without intending to tell her parents what had happened.
Her mother nevertheless sensed instinctively that something had happened - 'but I'd rather not know what', she told a relative.
Wrote Dr Lee: 'My mother knew me better than I knew myself.'
By accounts, Mrs Lee practised tough love when the children were growing up, making sure that they never threw their weight around although they were the offspring of the prime minister.
When the need called for it, she did not spare the rod 'when the children were particularly naughty or disobedient', recounted Minister Mentor Lee Kuan Yew in his memoirs.
'She brought them up well-mannered and self-disciplined,' he wrote.
As the family's main breadwinner during the early days of MM Lee's foray into politics, she worked long hours at the law firm she had co-founded with MM Lee and his brother, but would forego business lunches so as to be with the children.
In the evenings, she would take them to 'run around the Istana grounds while Kuan Yew played golf or practised on the practice tee and the putting green', she recalled in an interview with The Straits Times. 'And I remember taking them along to PAP picnics, and to Pulau Ubin to visit the Outward Bound School.'
For holidays, the family would visit the Cameron Highlands or Fraser's Hill in Malaysia at least once or twice a year - up to 1965. After that, they would vacation in Changi.
She took quiet pride in the children's achievements.
For instance, when Dr Lee had essays published in the Chinese newspapers, she would cut them out and paste them neatly in an exercise book.
Educated in Chinese-medium schools, their command of English is her achievement. A voracious reader with a passion for literature, she corrected their grammatical errors.
But the couple left it to the children to decide their careers, although she did dissuade Dr Lee, who was fond of dogs, against a career as a vet.
After the trio grew up, Mrs Lee's role evolved from a disciplinarian to that of confidante and companion.
In cahoots with her daughter, she persuaded Mr Lee on his 75th birthday to donate the proceeds from his book sales to polytechnic and Institute of Technical Education students instead of academically gifted students.
Her advice was often laced with her trademark humour.
Dr Lee recounted how as a by-product of being MM Lee's daughter, various people would ask to meet her though they had nothing specific to say to her.
'My mother used to say wryly of such people: 'If they cannot see the panda, the panda's daughter may be an acceptable substitute.'
She was a brilliant student and a sharp conveyancing lawyer. But it was clear that being a wife and mother were the most important roles to Mrs Lee.
In 2003, when the family auctioned for charity various personal possessions, she kept one thing: a pair of small ivory seals which she and Mr Lee had used to stamp the report cards of their three children. Another of her prized possessions was a gold pendant that Mr Lee had commissioned for her, with the engraved Chinese characters 'xian qi liang mu' (virtuous wife and caring mother) and 'nei xian wai de' (wise in looking after the family, virtuous in behaviour towards the outside world).
Dr Lee has written of how she had once e-mailed her mother when her toothbrush needed replacing. Mrs Lee e-mailed back:
'I am telepathic. I just got a toothbrush for you.
'But one day, the commissariat will not be around.'
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)