Lim Ah Bee Ronnie and Shervelle
Mr Lim Ah Bee Ronnie BBM:
For Ronnie, life as a kid in the late forties and early fifties below the age of seven was routine - no kindergarten but coming from a farming family, had to spend the day weeding in the farm and looking for food for the various animals which we reared for sale. His family of seven- five boys and two girls were very naive. When the mother told them that she counted all the ripe rambutans and they were not supposed to touch them or be punished, they believed it.
Their farm had to give way to the development of Serangoon Garden Estate and they moved to a big plot of land at Cheng San road near Kg Cheng San CC. From here, he started his primary school at Boundary Road, a long walk through a cemetery and “Chia Keng”, a kampong off Yio Chu Kang road. The stories of the cemetery brought great fear whenever he walked through it, especially in the evening when it was raining. His school allowance was ten cents a day.
As a student, life at Cheng San road was not a bed of roses. His mother divided housework into:
Cooking rice in a pot over a firewood stove.
Carrying drinking water with buckets.
Washing clothes manually.
Ironing clothes with a charcoal iron.
Cleaning and sweeping the house and compound. Each of them was rostered to take one job and the routine was changed weekly.
Once they finish their rostered jobs. They were free to do their own work. They did all kinds of things except study as there was no one to push them to do so. They spend their time catching birds and fishes for sale with traps they invented and roamed the whole countryside plucking fruits including those from the compounds of the landed house in Serangoon Gardens. In the evening, they gathered at Kg Cheng San CC for games and to watch TV. It was here that he had his first taste of community work, as Chairman of the youth group, and member of the CCMC.
When he started work, they had to move house again to make way for the development of Ang Mo Kio Estate. They were resettled to a flat in Cheng San Constituency. It was here that the MP invited him to join the GRO as Chairman of the Constituency Sports Club, a position he held for more than 20 years. He helped to kick start the various GROs including the Town Council, Market and Shop Keepers Committee, the RCs, and the building of the Community Centre.
Shervelle:
Compared to the life of a child in the fifties that was spent helping out in the family farm, Shervelle was sent to early childhood education centres, starting from as young as 18 months. Even after attending preschool from 7am-5pm, she’d have to attend English enrichment classes once a week. At a young age, her life was already heavily centred around her education.
From P1 to P5, she would take the school bus to go to school and to get back home despite only staying a ten-minute walk away. She took the bus every day until her parents deemed her independent enough to be able to walk to school and back on her own at P6. Her daily allowance was two dollars a day, twenty times more than the ten cents allowance a kid would get in the fifties. In 2014, all ten cents could get you was a two-minute phone call. Nothing in the canteen was being sold for a price as low as ten cents.
As a child, even up to the age of 14, it was never necessary for her to help out with the chores. Her family was able to afford a domestic helper to take care of the family’s needs. Most chores could easily be done with the help of modern technology anyway, such as using the washing machine instead of manually washing clothes. Up till now, her main focus has always been her studies, only occasionally on the helper’s day off would she be needed to help out with chores.
After going to school and completing schoolwork, there was still tuition homework and tuition classes to attend. Even if she had free time, she spent most of it watching TV with her family or using her devices like the computer or smartphone. Compared to the hours she spent at home, she rarely went out, especially after she turned eleven as her workload started to increase. There were no “adventures” like catching birds, climbing trees or roaming the countryside because of urbanisation. The furthest an outdoor “adventure” went was scooting from playground to playground in her neighbourhood.
She entered secondary school in 2020, the time when the Covid pandemic had hit Singapore and made everyone restricted to their homes. Everything from day-to-day lessons and talks to CCA sessions and learning journeys had to be done online, which limited the engagement and interaction between a speaker and their audience that they’d otherwise be able to have in person. Even her debate competitions had to be shifted online, but that did not take away the thrill of debating and of course the pride and joy that she felt after knowing she and her team had advanced to the next round of the competition.
