Jo-Anne
Rendle
1966-1969
Kinder, Gr 1 and 2
Email: j_ag_au@hotmail.com
My memories of Penang are vague as I was just starting out at school in the mid
to late 60s. We were lucky enough to enjoy a posting to Singapore just as I was
starting high school, so my memories are probably a mixture of the two places
though obviously I remember more of the later posting... sights, sounds and smells
being very much the same.
We lived in 14 Jalan Cheah Phee Cheok at the
foot of scouts hill. I remember the red tiles and the red wax the amahs used to
put on them which always came off onto our knees and the soles of our feet. I
can still smell the stuff. I remember the singing cries of the shoe repair man
as he came down the street. My sisters and I would climb on the big front gates
and call out copying him.. Shoooooee RepaaAAAiiR! Something we all still sing
out and chuckle about (at our cheekiness) whenever memories of Penang come up.
I remember the goats coming down from the hill to eat the grass outside our houses
and the wild dogs coming down at dusk. The curfew when some nights we'd all hop
over neighbours' high fences to get home because we weren't allowed out on the
streets.
I barely remember anything of school, only being picked up
by the teski for kinder, my white uniform for school, catching the 'big bus' by
myself, milk for morning tea and a looming white building...thanks to the photos
on this site those scattered images I kept from my childhood have become a clearer
picture of what it all was.
Cynthia, you have done (and continue to
do) a wonderful thing by creating this site. You've unlocked a lot of memories
for me and kept it all alive for all of us. I know there is a lot of work involved.
Thank you.