The Rose of Singapore Read Free Page B

were dead, massacred by the invaders; and this happened just ten years back, in 1942. Now, with its tragic memories partially concealed beneath a thick mantle of tropical undergrowth, the island lay as peacefully as it did before any conqueror came to its shores.
    Behind Fortress Island lay the much larger island of Pulau Tekong Besar, its towering hills seemingly always shrouded in jungle mist, and blending with the steamy coastline of Johore.
    During the past nine weeks, Peter Saunders had often explored the islands off Changi’s shores by renting a canoe-like fishing craft from Pop, a short, thick-set, very active middle-aged Chinese fisherman who never wore anything except a pair of dirty old khaki shorts, and a smile on his weather-beaten, good-natured face.
    Pop owned and operated a coffee shop on the beach, a crude shack really, made from driftwood and old sailcloth; its roof thatched palm fronds and rusty sheets of galvanized iron. It was situated roughly a hundred feet above a line of dried seaweed and little bits of refuse that had been washed ashore by the last highest tide. Here, Pop rented out four rowing boats and two primitive but very seaworthy native canoes by the hour to the beach-goers, mostly RAF personnel from Changi. His petite wife, Momma, assisted him in running the shack by selling to its patrons Green Spot orange drink, fried rice and other Chinese foods. Momma was about thirty, friendly, smiled a lot and showed off her many gold teeth. Pop and Momma had four very young children. The elder girl and two boys, happily nude and suntanned, were either getting underfoot in the shack, playing in the boats or running around on the beach laughing and making lots of noise. A newborn baby girl spent most of her time sleeping in a crib suspended by a heavy coiled spring attached to a bamboo beam supporting the roof of the shack. The family also had a friendly, skinny, brownish-coloured mongrel dog which rested its chin on the knees of patrons to the shack, and looked up at them with big brown sad eyes imploring them for a handout of whatever was being eaten. Also living in the shack was a flock of chickens, which clucked happily as they ate food dropped to them. And when there was no food being dropped, they pecked at the great variety of insects that emerged from every nook and cranny of that flotsam-built shack. Pop’s coffee shop was quite an interesting place and by visiting the beach whenever he had the opportunity, which was almost daily, Peter Saunders had become one of Pop’s best customers.
    Deep in thought, Peter now gazed across the broad expanse of water separating Singapore from Malaya. His journey from his mother and three brothers in Plymouth, England, had seen him posted first to Hong Kong and later to Kuala Lumpur in Malaya, and remustering from a fighter plotter to a cook. With twenty-eight other fighter plotters straight from the Royal Air Force radar and fighter plotter training school at RAF Bawdsey in Suffolk, he had been en route to Korea from Liverpool on the troopship Empire Pride when, on reaching the docks at Kowloon, Hong Kong, he and the other twenty-eight were informed that there was a glut of fighter plotters in Korea. What could be done with them? They were not wanted in Korea. The RAF could not lose face by returning them the ten thousand miles or more to England. Hence, they were dumped at Kowloon docks, taken by military vehicles to RAF Kai Tak airport, and as good as told to get lost until the great minds at the top decided what to do with twenty-nine redundant fighter plotters. Peter thought of the several months he and the others had slept in tents at the edge of a runway, sleeping late, eating the finest food he had ever known, taking daily swims in the camp pool, and freely and happily sightseeing fascinating Hong Kong. He had done guard duty often, and had been given odd jobs to do from time to time. He had painted the sergeants’ mess, cleaned aircraft,