EULOGY BY MINISTER MENTOR AT THE FUNERAL SERVICE OF MRS LEE
KUAN YEW, MANDAI CREMATORIUM, 6 OCTOBER 2010
The last farewell to my wife
Ancient peoples developed and ritualised mourning practices to
express the shared grief of family and friends, and together show not fear or
distaste for death, but respect for the dead one; and to give comfort to the living
who will miss the deceased. I recall the ritual mourning when my maternal
grandmother died some 75 years ago. For five nights the family would gather to
sing her praises and wail and mourn at her departure, led by a practised
professional mourner. Such rituals are no longer observed. My family’s sorrow is
to be expressed in personal tributes to the matriarch of our family.
In October 2003 when she had her first stroke, we had a strong
intimation of our mortality.
My wife and I have been together since 1947 for more than three
quarters of our lives. My grief at her passing cannot be expressed in words. But
today, when recounting our lives together, I would like to celebrate her life.
In our quiet moments, we would revisit our lives and times together.
We had been most fortunate. At critical turning points in our lives, fortune
favoured us.
As a young man with an interrupted education at Raffles College,
and no steady job or profession, her parents did not look upon me as a desirable
son-in-law. But she had faith in me. We had committed ourselves to each other.
I decided to leave for England in September 1946 to read law, leaving her to
return to Raffles College to try to win one of the two Queen’s Scholarships
awarded yearly. We knew that only one Singaporean would be awarded. I had
the resources, and sailed for England, and hoped that she would join me after
winning the Queen’s Scholarship. If she did not win it, she would have to wait for
me for three years.
In June the next year, 1947, she did win it. But the British colonial
office could not get her a place in Cambridge.
Through Chief Clerk of Fitzwilliam, I discovered that my Censor at
Fitzwilliam, W S Thatcher, was a good friend of the Mistress of Girton, Miss
Butler. He gave me a letter of introduction to the Mistress. She received me and
I assured her that Choo would most likely take a “First”, because she was the
better student when we both were at Raffles College. I had come up late by one
term to Cambridge, yet passed my first year qualifying examination with a class
1. She studied Choo’s academic record and decided to admit her in October that
same year, 1947.
We have kept each other company ever since. We married
privately in December 1947 at Stratford-upon-Avon. At Cambridge, we both put
in our best efforts. She took a first in two years in Law Tripos II. I took a double
first, and a starred first for the finals, but in three years. We did not disappoint
our tutors. Our Cambridge Firsts gave us a good start in life. Returning to
Singapore, we both were taken on as legal assistants in Laycock & Ong, a
thriving law firm in Malacca Street. Then we married officially a second time that
September 1950 to please our parents and friends. She practised conveyancing
and draftsmanship, I did litigation.
In February 1952, our first son Hsien Loong was born. She took
maternity leave for a year. That February, I was asked by John Laycock, the
Senior Partner, to take up the case of the Postal and Telecommunications
Uniformed Staff Union, the postmen’s union. They were negotiating with the
government for better terms and conditions of service. Negotiations were
deadlocked and they decided to go on strike. It was a battle for public support. I
was able to put across the reasonableness of their case through the press and
radio. After a fortnight, they won concessions from the government. Choo, who
was at home on maternity leave, pencilled through my draft statements, making
them simple and clear.
Over the years, she influenced my writing style. Now I write in
short sentences, in the active voice. We gradually influenced each other’s ways
and habits as we adjusted and accommodated each other. We knew that we
could not stay starry-eyed lovers all our lives; that life was an on-going challenge
with new problems to resolve and manage.
We had two more children, Wei Ling in 1955 and Hsien Yang in
1957. She brought them up to be well-behaved, polite, considerate and never to
throw their weight as the prime minister’s children. As a lawyer, she earned
enough, to free me from worries about the future of our children.
She saw the price I paid for not having mastered Mandarin when I
was young. We decided to send all three children to Chinese kindergarten and
schools. She made sure they learned English and Malay well at home. Her
nurturing has equipped them for life in a multi-lingual region.
We never argued over the upbringing of our children, nor over
financial matters. Our earnings and assets were jointly held. We were each
other’s confidant.
She had simple pleasures. We would walk around the Istana
gardens in the evening, and I hit golf balls to relax. Later, when we had
grandchildren, she would take them to feed the fish and the swans in the Istana
ponds. Then we would swim. She was interested in her surroundings, for
instance, that many bird varieties were pushed out by mynahs and crows eating
up the insects and vegetation. She discovered the curator of the gardens had
cleared wild grasses and swing fogged for mosquitoes, killing off insects they fed
on. She stopped this and the bird varieties returned. She surrounded the
swimming pool with free flowering scented flowers and derived great pleasure
smelling them as she swam. She knew each flower by its popular and botanical
names. She had an enormous capacity for words.
She had majored in English literature at Raffles College and was a
voracious reader, from Jane Austen to JRR Tolkien, from Thucydides’ The
Peloponnesian Wars to Virgil’s Aeneid, to The Oxford Companion to Food, and
Seafood of Southeast Asia, to Roadside Trees of Malaya, and Birds of
Singapore.
She helped me draft the Constitution of the PAP. For the
inaugural meeting at Victoria Memorial Hall on 4 November 1954, she gathered
the wives of the founder members to sew rosettes for those who were going on
stage. In my first election for Tanjong Pagar, our home in Oxley Road, became
the HQ to assign cars provided by my supporters to ferry voters to the polling
booth. She warned me that I could not trust my new found associates, the leftwing
trade unionists led by Lim Chin Siong. She was furious that he never sent
their high school student helpers to canvass for me in Tanjong Pagar, yet
demanded the use of cars provided by my supporters to ferry my Tanjong Pagar
voters. She had an uncanny ability to read the character of a person. She would
sometimes warn me to be careful of certain persons; often, she turned out to be
right.
When we were about to join Malaysia, she told me that we would
not succeed because the UMNO Malay leaders had such different lifestyles and
because their politics were communally-based, on race and religion. I replied
that we had to make it work as there was no better choice. But she was right.
We were asked to leave Malaysia before two years.
When separation was imminent, Eddie Barker, as Law Minister,
drew up the draft legislation for the separation. But he did not include an
undertaking by the Federation Government to guarantee the observance of the
two water agreements between the PUB and the Johor state government. I
asked Choo to include this. She drafted the undertaking as part of the
constitutional amendment of the Federation of Malaysia Constitution itself. She
was precise and meticulous in her choice of words. The amendment statute was
annexed to the Separation Agreement, which we then registered with the United
Nations. The then Commonwealth Secretary Arthur Bottomley said that if other
federations were to separate, he hoped they would do it as professionally as
Singapore and Malaysia. It was a compliment to Eddie’s and Choo’s
professional skills. Each time Malaysian Malay leaders threatened to cut off our
water supply, I was reassured that this clear and solemn international
undertaking by the Malaysian government in its Constitution will get us a ruling
by the UNSC (United Nations Security Council).
After her first stroke, she lost her left field of vision. This slowed
down her reading. She learned to cope, reading with the help of a ruler. She
swam every evening and kept fit. She continued to travel with me, and stayed
active despite the stroke. She stayed in touch with her family and old friends.
She listened to her collection of CDs, mostly classical, plus some golden oldies.
She jocularly divided her life into “before stroke” and “after stroke”, like BC and
AD.
She was friendly and considerate to all associated with her. She
would banter with her WSOs (woman security officers) and correct their English
grammar and pronunciation in a friendly and cheerful way. Her former WSOs
visited her when she was at NNI. I thank them all. (Listed in Appendix A)
Her second stroke on 12 May 2008 was more disabling. I
encouraged and cheered her on, helped by a magnificent team of doctors,
surgeons, therapists and nurses. (Listed in Appendix B.)
Her nurses, WSOs and maids all grew fond of her because she
was warm and considerate. When she coughed, she would take her small pillow
to cover her mouth because she worried for them and did not want to infect them.
Her mind remained clear but her voice became weaker. When I
kissed her on her cheek, she told me not to come too close to her in case I
caught her pneumonia. I assured her that the doctors did not think that was likely
because I was active. When given some peaches in hospital, she asked the
maid to take one home for my lunch. I was at the centre of her life.
On 24 June 2008, a CT scan revealed another bleed again on the
right side of her brain. There was not much more that medicine or surgery could
do except to keep her comfortable.
I brought her home on 3 July 2008. The doctors expected her to
last a few weeks. She lived till 2nd October, 2 years and 3 months. She
remained lucid. They gave time for me and my children to come to terms with
the inevitable. In the final few months, her faculties declined. She could not
speak but her cognition remained. She looked forward to have me talk to her
every evening.
Her last wish she shared with me was to enjoin our children to have
our ashes placed together, as we were in life.
The last two years of her life were the most difficult. She was bedridden
after small successive strokes; she could not speak but she was still
cognisant. Every night she would wait for me to sit by her to tell her of my day’s
activities and to read her favourite poems. Then she would sleep.
I have precious memories of our 63 years together. Without her, I
would be a different man, with a different life. She devoted herself to me and our
children. She was always there when I needed her. She has lived a life full of
warmth and meaning.
I should find solace at her 89 years of her life well lived. But at this
moment of the final parting, my heart is heavy with sorrow and grief.
------------
7
Appendix A
Minister Mentor’s Private Office
Principal Private Secretary: Chee Hong Tat
Press Secretary: Yeong Yoon Ying
Personal Assistants: Wong Lin Hoe, Koh Kiang Chay, Lilian Ho
Security Officers and Woman Security Officers:
Alice Lim Siew Cheng, Alice Goh Siew Hiang, Catherine Tan Noi Keo, Goh Ai
Hoon, Silver Ng Su Meng, Karen Ng Poh Ling, Mae Teo Siew Inn, Joey Leong
Kai Mun, Joyce Chong Ai Lin, Jillian Phua, Teo Cheng Piau, Tan Yew Eng,
Mervin Kwong Hoong Fai, Tong Ming Ming, Mok Suay Kheng, Angie Lee Ai
Chern
8
Appendix B
Doctors:
- NNI: Dr Lee Kim En (Neurology), Dr Ivan Ng (Neurosurgery), Dr Francis Hui
(Neuroradiology);
- TTSH: Dr Suresh Sahadevan (General Medicine), Dr Chin Jing Jih (Geriatric
Medicine), Dr Karen Chua (Rehabilitation Medicine), Dr Kwek Tong Kiat
(Anaesthesia); Thomas Lew (Anaesthesia)
- SGH: Prof Fong Kok Yong (Rheumatology); Dr A Balakrishnan (ENT)
- NDC: Dr Yuen Kwong Wing (Senior Consultant), Dr Marianne Ong (Consultant)
Nurses:
- TTSH: Wong Mui Peng, Ranbhir Kaur, Lily Ng, Tina Tng, Ten Siew Hwa, Heng
Mui Chu, Lily Toh
- NNI: Tan IL Fan
- KTPH: Liu Xiao Yan
- SGH: Elaine Yek, Eileen Robert Jacob, Li Ying and Jacqueline Teo
Therapists:
- Physiotherapy: Susan Niam, Seah Wei Wei
- Occupational therapy: Chan Mei Leng, David Zhang
- Speech therapy: Leow Li Pyn, Sharon Wu
Masseurs:
Heng Li Hoong, Lynne Teo
