Flavours of Change

the long version

Former Member of Parliament and diplomat Joe Conceicao has vivid recollections of the kampong ambience of his varied early years in the Singapore of the 1920s and 1930s. But Katong became his special matrix and Singapore his larger womb for growth. He was an adolescent at the time of the Japanese Invasion and Occupation and learned many lessons, some painful, others enlightening. He was often able to glean some humour from the vicissitudes of life: his account of his career as a grass-cutter for the Japanese is priceless. After the war, he experienced brief cycles of work as a police clerk, petroleum clerk and administrative clerk, before deciding to become a teacher. But nagged by good and evil spirits, Joe left St Patrick's School to gain a degree. He later joined the university as a teacher-administrator in what was then the perceived “black-sheep” department of continuing education. This turned out to be his stepping-stone to a political career. He both enjoyed and suffered in his new role, and survived to become an ambassador of his country.