A BRIEF HISTORY OF LIFE IN REME
A Craftsman’s Story 1948 to I953
Contributed by: Phil KEMPSTER
Chapter
Seventeen.
Singapore and Malaya Revisited.
I
returned to Singapore and Malaysia
in 2000. Jean had always wanted to go
and see where I had served there, so I got British Airways to make us a two
week tailor-made tour. I wasn't keen
on the 12 hour flight to Singapore
but it was well worth it. We had two
days in Singapore
and I recognized a few places but the changes that had been made to the
island were amazing, skyscrapers galore and everywhere so clean. We did two coach tours in the short time we
were there, very tiring but well worth it.
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Our Singapore
hotel in the centre.
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Singapore city centre.
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Looking across the river towards Singapore city centre.
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A view of Singapore across the river.
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Myself by the river reliving memories of the past.
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Jean learning how to tap rubber in Singapore.
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After
that we went by taxi to Johore to pick up a car. I managed to find Majeede
Camp, it now belonged to the Malay Regiment.
They wouldn’t let me in or take pictures but it was nice to see the
entrance. We then travelled up the
east coast road to Malacca this was a good dual carriageway, a big change to
the last time I travelled on it in 1952.
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On the way to Malacca, up country in Malaysia.
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We stayed
two nights in Malacca and there were a lot of changes going on there. We then travelled on to Kuala Lumpur, what an amazing City that
is. The hotel we stayed in was facing
the Twin Towers. We had a tour around the city. I never got to Kuala Lumpur when I was out there but some
of my mates did.
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Services, Malaysian style, on the way to Kuala Lumpur.
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The twin towers in Kuala Lumpur
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The War Memorial in Kuala Lumpur
1914 – 1918.
!939 – 1945
1946 - 1963
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Myself in front of the National War Memorial to those
who died in the service of their country.
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We
then travelled up to the Cameron
Highlands and do you
know that the winding narrow road that I travelled up in the back of a truck
on is still the same.
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A view from the narrow, winding road up to the Cameron Highlands.
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We
stayed three nights there. I found the
B.M.H. building it’s now a Convent
School. We had a conducted tour round the buildings
by the caretaker who worked there as a young lad when it was the B.M.H. That brought back a few memories. Jean loved this area and the climate is not
too hot. We had a visit to the B.O.H.
tea plantation and some nice botanical gardens.
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This was the B.M.H. Cameron
Highlands which is
now a convent.
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Boh Tea Plantation in the
Cameron Highlands.
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Roadside repairs on the way back from the Cameron Highlands.
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Small roadside village on the way down from the Cameron Highlands.
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A typical Kampong where the local people lived.
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The
hotel we stayed at was the Lakeside Hotel, a Tudor style building that once
belonged to a British high ranking officer. We travelled on from here to
spend the rest of our holiday in Penang,
that’s another place that I had never been to before, there used to be an RAF
base there at Butterworth. I think
that is now the airport that we flew to Kuala Lumpur
from on our way back to the UK.
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More photographs related to this chapter can be
accessed from the link below.
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Published: 1st November 2007
Updated: 1st December 2007
  Abbreviations and Army Slang
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