10 Mar 2008 – Johor Bahru Speakers’ Club

Pat Lim invited me to speak and her gracious hospitality is much appreciated. The red brick hospital building where her husband Kee Chin works, can still be recognised even with with new wings added on. During my childhood visits in the 1950s, our families feasted on crabs by the seafront with the view of lush green jungles across the causeway to Singapore, quite a contrast with today’s view!

Pat has done extensive research into her genealogy and has written 2 books, Wong Ah Fook-The Family Book and Immigrant, Builder & Entrepreneur. I am looking forward to learning from her about our families. My grandfather Lam Song Kee bought 5 Temenggong Rd, Singapore from her grandfather who bought it from the Temenggong (an ancient Malay title of nobility).

Many thanks to Yang Amat Mulia Tunku Hajah Shahariah binti Tuanku Abdul Rahman, President of the JB Speakers’ Club and to Datin Maimunah Abdul Rahman, Executive Director of M Suites Hotel for hosting the talk, complimented with delicious food to a wonderful audience in lovely surroundings.

If you don’t know your family history, then you don’t know anything. You are a leaf that doesn’t know it is part of a tree – Michael Crichton