{"id":2820,"date":"2022-04-21T08:34:19","date_gmt":"2022-04-21T08:34:19","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/thevillagemyhome.com\/?p=2820"},"modified":"2022-04-26T15:23:41","modified_gmt":"2022-04-26T15:23:41","slug":"the-promised-land","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/thevillagemyhome.com\/zh\/the-promised-land\/","title":{"rendered":"Journey to the Promised Land"},"content":{"rendered":"
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From Grit to Great :\u00a0 The story of the Foochows .<\/div>\n
By Foong Pek Yee<\/div>\n
foongpekyee@gmail.com<\/a><\/div>\n
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THEY finally arrived at their destination on Sept 9 after surviving the perilous journey.<\/div>\n
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There were 303 on board, while another 60 arrived a week later.<\/div>\n
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And that was in September 1903 –\u00a0 the beginning of the Foochows in Sitiawan, Perak.<\/div>\n
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Together we progress:\u00a0 Tan Sri Dr Ting Chew Peh (left) who was then the\u00a0 Housing and Local Government Minister opened the Manjung Kutien Association Building in 1994.\u00a0 He is a Kutien and his hometown is Merbau New Village in Manjung.<\/strong><\/div>\n
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According to the book “The Foochows of Sitiawan: a historical perspective” this pioneer group were from China’s Foochow rice growing community.<\/div>\n
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The author Shih Toong Siong said the then Colonial Administration in Malaya wanted to ” transplant” this community in Sitiawan.<\/div>\n
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The mission was to turn Sitiawan into a rice growing region, and to meet the rising demand for the staple food as more immigrants arrived in Malaya to work in the tin mines.<\/div>\n
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The Methodist Episcopal Mission (MEM) which was tasked to undertake this “transplant”, had assigned Rev Ling Ching Mi and\u00a0 Rev. Dr H.L.E Luering to the job.<\/div>\n
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Of the 484 Foochows who boarded the ship and set sail for Malaya on\u00a0 Aug 3, 1903, only 363 made it to the promised land.<\/div>\n
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Four days into the journey saw five deaths which were attributed to cholera and exhaustion.<\/div>\n
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They arrived in Singapore for quarantine on the St John’s Island on Aug 22, where many either died or went missing in transit.<\/div>\n
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The final headcount was 363 when they were ready to set sail for\u00a0 Sitiawan.<\/div>\n
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But their ordeal was far from over upon arrival – they did not get what as promised to them , and from then they only had their resilience to survive in the tropical wilderness.<\/div>\n
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True to the Chinese saying ” we get up from where we fell” – the Foochows have proven their mettle the day they step foot on Malayan soil.<\/div>\n
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United and strong:\u00a0 The Manjung Kutien Association was set up in 1956, and Ling (right) and the association’s committee member Ting Hsia Sung showing a photo of the historical day.<\/strong><\/div>\n
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The place: Ayer Tawar Heritage House in Ayer Tawar, Manjung is a showcase of the Foochows’ way of life in Manjung from the early 20th century and beyond.<\/strong><\/div>\n
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Proud descendants: Foochows\u00a0 at the opening of the Ayer Tawar Heritage House in 2016<\/strong><\/div>\n
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Today, the Ayer Tawar Heritage House in Ayer Tawar, about 65 km from Ipoh, will give a glimpse of the life of the Foochows in Ayer Tawar and Sitiawan from the day they landed in Sitiawan.<\/div>\n
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Ayer Tawar is about 12km from Sitiawan, and the Chinese in both towns are predominantly Foochows.<\/div>\n
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One of the landmarks in Ayer Tawar is the Manjung Kutien Association Building along the main road of Ayer Tawar<\/div>\n
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Kutien is one of the 10 sub dialects of Foochows (sub dialects\u00a0 are\u00a0 based on their respective district in China) , and the Ayer Tawar Heritage House is under the Manjung Kutien Association.<\/div>\n
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The heritage house chairman Ling Sze Hing says the artefacts, mostly donated by the locals, are dated back to more than a century ago.<\/div>\n
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He says the heritage house opened doors in 2016,\u00a0 and entrance is free and by appointment (019-5582543)<\/div>\n
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Ling, 56, says he and his committee are coming up with a research centre on Foochows in the heritage house – to make it the place to go to for people who are interested to find out more on Foochows, especially the Kutien.<\/div>\n
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A Kutien himself, Ling’s passion and pride on anything Kutien a and Foochow\u00a0 is palpable.<\/div>\n
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Hardwork:\u00a0 Mr Ling showing how to operate a traditional grinder<\/strong><\/div>\n
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Bare necessities:\u00a0 Irons using charcoals (top row) and pots used during the old days.<\/strong><\/div>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

From Grit to Great :\u00a0 The story of the Foochows . By Foong Pek Yee foongpekyee@gmail.com THEY finally arrived at their destination on Sept 9 after surviving the perilous journey. There were 303 on board, while another 60 arrived a week later. And that was in September 1903 –\u00a0 the beginning of the Foochows in … Continue reading “Journey to the Promised Land”<\/span><\/a><\/p>","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"advanced_seo_description":"","jetpack_seo_html_title":"","jetpack_seo_noindex":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[52,54],"tags":[185,183,180,182,181,184,186],"class_list":["post-2820","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-people","category-places","tag-ayer-tawar","tag-colonial-government","tag-foochows","tag-heritage-house","tag-manjung","tag-manjung-kutien-association","tag-rice-planting"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack-related-posts":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/thevillagemyhome.com\/zh\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2820","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/thevillagemyhome.com\/zh\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/thevillagemyhome.com\/zh\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thevillagemyhome.com\/zh\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thevillagemyhome.com\/zh\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2820"}],"version-history":[{"count":18,"href":"https:\/\/thevillagemyhome.com\/zh\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2820\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":2867,"href":"https:\/\/thevillagemyhome.com\/zh\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2820\/revisions\/2867"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/thevillagemyhome.com\/zh\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2820"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thevillagemyhome.com\/zh\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2820"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thevillagemyhome.com\/zh\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2820"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}