www.Go To The Mountain - Musings of a Potential Guru

Singapore is developing so fast that one by one my childhood memories and places are being wiped out. Old memories are good and future ones may not be so we had better treasure it. The names of the roads and places are still there but everything or most have been transformed.  I decided I wanted a bit of nostalgia so I came to Balestier/Kim Keat and Whampoa. Balestier is the main road and Kim Keat and Whampoa are parallel to each other. You get further down and you will reach Jalan Bahagia and Jalan Tenteram and across the highway of PIE Jalan Toa Payoh on the opposite side was where my paternal grandparents lived. My now defunct Kim Keat Primary School at Kim Keat Road was within walking distance to all neighbour children from all the above named places. My maternal grandparents lived in Jalan Kemaman (along Balestier Road)  and this is where I grew up during the formative years.  My first stop took me the Whampoa as I was thinking through my stomach as it was l...

I used to know many friends from childhood who grew up from the same vicinity. They were living in Kim Keat, Jalan Bahagia, Jalan Tenteram and later Toa Payoh. Oh yes, we mustn't forget Whampoa. Kim Keat Kim Keat used to have a primary school and behind it a vocational institute, a precursor to our current ITE. Primary school students are not allowed to go to the vocational school but I broke the rule once when I heard they had a canteen (known previously as tuck shop) stall that served the best mee rebus. It was true! The old houses just outside the school are low lying types, unpretentious and promoted good neighbourliness due to the way it was built. There was a pushcart stall peddling coconut and pineapple drinks just outside the school's main gate, you know the kind of pineapple where they let you dip in dark soy sauce with red cut chili in them and was every one's favourite?  Just next to the school was a government clinic which nobody liked as we went th...