Tag: land

No ordinary community

The destination: This is the place in Sitiawan in Sept 1903  where 363 Foochows from China  landed after surviving the perils of sea and a cholera outbreak.
Jan 15, 2023
By Foong Pek Yee
THE year was 1903 in Malaya, against a backdrop of erratic weather conditions and plunging rice yields.
And a rice growing community in Foochow, China, became the colonial government’s target- recruit them for a rice growing project in Sitiawan, Perak.
The Methodist Episcopal Mission (MEM) was tasked to bring in the Foochows, and Rev Ling Ching Mi and Rev HLE Dr Luering went to China for the mission.
And  in Sept 1903,  363  Foochows landed in Sitiawan – the pioneer batch of Foochow settlers.
But the rice growing project never took off.
The land and facilities like irrigation and drainage for the project as  promised to them were not there.
They were instead made to trek about six kilometers  into the jungle where they stayed in seven longhouses for the next six months.
While  Rev  Dr Luering was stationed in Ipoh about 80 km away from Sitiawan, Rev Ling Ching Mi also  got a transfer back to China in Dec 1903.
Ling Ching Mi got his nephew Ling Ti Kong to take care of the settlers.
And Ling Ti  Kong also roped in Ding Chin Seng (husband of his father’s sister) to help him.
Ling Ching Mi, Ling Ti Kong and Ding Chin Seng were Foochows.
By Jan 1904, the Foochows  had set up  a day school under an attap shed with 22 pupils and a Foochow speaking teacher Ling Ding Jug for an eight hour class daily including an hour long break.
This is true to the Chinese  who subscribe to: ” Education for and the wellbeing of the children must never be compromised due to poverty.
 The shed also doubled as a church on Sundays.
By  early 1904  each family was given a three-acre- plot for them to build their own house and reared pigs, poultry and plant vegetables and fruits for a living.
The Foochows also went into rubber planting not long after.
Forever grateful:  Ling Leong Choong, 62, says this was one of the three wells that fed  the villagers for decades until piped water came to Sitiawan in the 1970s. The wells are in the compound of the house for Pioneer Methodist Church pastors  or “Muk Su Lao” in Chinese. 
Showcase: Set up in 2003, Sitiawan Settlement Museum was  formerly the ” Muk  Su Lao”along  Jalan Lin Chen Mei  in Sitiawan. It provides a glimpse of life in Sitiawan in the good old days and the missionary work in then Malaya. 
One-stop-centre:  The” Muk Su Lao” was the place for the Chinese to go for help in the old days.
Great job:  Shih Toong Siong who wrote the book “The Foochows of Sitiawan ” is a Foochow born and educated 
in Sitiawan.
 Hall of Fame: Some of the prominent figures in Malaysia and Singapore who are descendants of the Foochows in Sitiawan  and documented in the  book – The Foochows of Sitiawan.
While the Sitiawan Settlement Museum  gives a glimpse of history,  the book ” The Foochows of Sitiawan” by Shih Toong Siong is most enlightening.
 Rev  B.F. Van Dyke who became the first resident missionary in Sitiawan together with Ling Ti Kong and Ding Chin Seng  were credited for building a church costing $900( to replace the attap shed) and an orphanage in Sitiawan in 1905
Rev Van Dyke – an American of Dutch origin- was a missionary school teacher from the Anglo Chinese School, Singapore in 1900 before his posting to Sitiawan in March 1904.
Unfortunately Rev Ding Chin Seng passed away in 1906. He was 41.
Ours is 289:  Ling Leong Choong who was born and bred in Sitiawan  says the rubber tappers had labels engraved on to the latex sheets to prove ownership. And 289 was the label for his family, pointing to the samples on the wall.  
Way of life:   Bicycle was the most common and only mode of transport for the poor  in the old days.  The equipment used by rubber tappers are among items displayed at the Sitiawan Settlement Museum.
Simple lifestyle:  A typical kitchen of the Foochows in the old days.
With their farming background, the settlers were also among the first to go into rubber planting in 1905.
And that perhaps is also one of the reasons for many Foochow oil palm smallholders in Sitiawan today.
This pioneer  batch of Foochows may be  small in numbers but they definitely had earned an important place in history.

A wish for his golden years

Liew Wong does not want to burden his children.

By Foong Pek Yee

foongpekyee@gmail.com

AT 56, Liew Wong is four years from the official retirement age.
He is relieved that his two children, in their late 20s, are working and independent.
Having toiled as a farmer for the last 30 years to raise his family, Liew says his wish from now on is to be able to take care of his wife and himself in their golden years.
“I do not want to depend on my children for a living,” says Liew as he gobbled up his lunch when met at Kanthan Baru New Village in Chemor, Perak recently.
His weather beaten face tells the story of a hard life.
He is the third generation of farmers in his family from the village.
Farming is a 365 days job from sunrise to sunset, he says.
As a small scale farmer, you are the boss and you and your family are the workers, says Liew, recalling he started to help his father in the farm when he was 10 years old.
It is all about working hard to survive day to day.
Today, his 86-year-old father continues to work in their farm, measuring about two acres where they planted the umbra fruit  (sar lei in Cantonese) and oil palm.
Make way: The entrance to Liew Wong’s farm. He got a notice to
 evict the land.
Farming and village life has its upside though.
They enjoy a peaceful and simple life in a close knitted community from generation to generation since the 1920s.
All is well until 2005 when land issues started to surface.
For many farmers, they toil on land without legal documents since their forefathers set foot in Chemor a century ago.
Since 17 years ago, development saw some farmers having to surrender their farmland when the area is earmarked for the purpose.
Nevermind that Chemor is known for vegetable farming, producing some 60,000 kilogram vegetables daily.
According to the farmers, the terrain and soil in Chemor are conducive for many types of vegetables –  from spinach, choy sam, brinjals, bitter gourds, chillies to maize.
“All along we are willing to pay to the landowners to lease the land, ” says Liew
According to him,  then Tambun Member of Parliament Datuk Seri Ahmad Husni Hanadzlah had in 2012  helped farmers to resolve the land issues.
However Liew says the signing of a  deal on land lease for  farmers was aborted at the last minute.
In December last year, Liew says he is among farmers in Chemor who received eviction notice.
“I don’t know where to get a job to survive if I lost my farm.
“Even young people find it hard to get jobs these days,”he says.

A struggle to keep family tradition

Destiny: Ah Thim and his world
By Foong Pek Yee
IT is a scorching hot afternoon.
But it is also any other day for Ah Thim.
From afar, he cuts a lonely figure in the vegetable farm.
At 54,  he has been a farmer since a teenager; with his life revolving  around his family, farm and Kanthan Baru New Village in Chemor, Perak,  where they stay.
As fate has it, Ah Thim was inducted into farming after his eldest brother’s death.
Recalling the tragedy losing his 20-year-old brother, Ah Thim who is second among four sons became the de facto head of his family – by Chinese tradition- in a then conservative society.
He has another five sisters.
As the de facto head,  Ah Thim was expected, if not duty bound,  to become a farmer, taking after his father and grandfather who were farmers and keeping the family together.
He became head of the family after his father passed away.
Fast track to the present, Ah Thim, as head of the family, stays with his 80-year-old plus mother and a younger sister who is single in their ancestral home.
He says the sister and a younger brother helps out in the farm.
Toiling on about an acre of land, planting turnips and spring onions, Ah Thim says that is their source of income.
He spends most of his waking hours in the farm.
“I am here by sunrise and work till late evening. In between I go home for lunch,” he says.
Vegetable farming can be  a back breaking job but Ah Thim is not complaining.
“I will continue to do my best. I am used to this way of life.”
Quiet and peaceful: A man fishing at a lake nearby  Ah Thim’s farm.
According to some elderly villagers, farming was their lifeline since their forefathers set foot in Chemor in the 1920s .
The lack of formal education, exposure and job opportunities saw many villagers continue to depend on  farming for a living despite all odds stacked against them these days.
Topping their list of woes is  land issues which surfaced about 17 years ago.
Farmers who have no legal documents on their farmland would have to make way once the land is earmarked for development.
In the case of Ah Thim, he is now left with about an acre of farmland only.
While he is worried over losing his last acre to development, he says he has to depend on the Persatuan Petani  Moden Chemor (Chemor Modern Farmers Association) for help on land issues.
“The matter is too complicated for me to understand,” he adds.
Amidst all the uncertainties, he is visibly happy when he spoke on his only  child- a son-  who is working in Singapore.
No matter what,  Ah Thim says he is always grateful waking up to a new day. .