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.'