I had taken some pride in having contributed to our family's finances after I graduated from University and started working in 1971. I remember giving the bulk of my first month's salary to my Mother. She refused initially but finally accepted it. When I saw her using it to pay the debts ( I remember it was RM500 and that was lot of money 4 decades ago) she owed to the provision shop man, I was really happy. I remember the provision shop man near our house used to send dry provisions to our house on a motorbike. Everytime he came, Mother would pay him a small amount, whatever she could afford. The rest that she owed him would be recorded in a small note book, commonly known as the 555 note book. Then every end of the month he would try to collect the balance but Mother always could not pay him in full. So the debt accumulated. I think after I started working and helped Mother on a regular basis, the situation improved. Several years later when my 3 brothers graduated I think they contributed too and Mother became less stressed financially.
Several weeks ago in a casual conversation with our eldest sister, I realized that what I did for the family financially was insigficant compared to her. My sister who is nearly 5 years older than me, started work after completing Secondary school. When she started working in KL at about 18-19 years old , I was still in Lower Secondary and it was another 10 years before I started working. It means that for 10 years, on her small income, she was actually helping Mother and Father to put food on the table for her 4 younger siblings and to put a roof over our heads. She told me that for many years after she started working she never had a savings account. I can understand why she felt so saddened when father's house was sold.
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| Our family in 1952 in Sabak Bernam, Selangor |
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| Our family in 1961 infront of our new house in Petaling Jaya |
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| Our family in 1973 when 2 of my brothers graduated |
SPeng
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