A Step Into The Past

by Susie Chilton née Fenner

Alumna, KLASS 1948-1950

After the war ended, my mother and I travelled back to Malaya as soon as we could to rejoin my father. He was the Officer in Charge of Police District (OCPD) in Kuala Kubu Bahru but with the start of the Emergency, was recalled to a Special Branch in Kuala Lumpur. I was five years old and needed to go to school. My mother had heard that Mrs Alice Fairfield-Smith was educating her daughter Lindsey and about five or six other children at home. I was sent to join the group which by then had moved to the slightly bigger premises of No 7 Eaton Road. This house was to have special significance later on because my husband proposed marriage to me there in 1961! He and two friends had rented the house from the Rubber Research Institute.

After the school moved to the Masonic Hall, which was known as the Rumah Hantu (!), new teachers were appointed to take four separate classes. My mother volunteered to do the accounts and send out the termly bills to parents. Mrs Jackson was my new class teacher and I adored her. For five year olds, lessons were fun and very relaxed, but the following year I went up a class and we had to take the business of learning a little more seriously. This was when I decided on a course of action which resulted in a little lesson that has stayed with me ever since.

One day, having made sure that Mrs Smith’s car was in the drive to take me home, I put my head on the desk and tried to look sick. My teacher, Mrs Muir, enquired what was wrong and I said, “I’ve got a sort of headache which is giving me a tummy ache,” and was sent off to see Mrs Smith. She sympathised and said she would drive me home. Hurrah! My plan was working.

After having spoken to my mother, Alice appeared and said, “Susie, I must tell you about the two little frogs who fell into a barrel of cream. One was very lazy and he sank to the bottom and drowned. The other was very busy and brave and kicked as hard as he could until the cream turned to butter. He jumped out and was saved”. Then she looked me in the eye and said in a gentle voice, “Well Susie, which little frog are you?” After a moment, I decided that I would go back to school and start behaving like a brave little frog!

I loved my happy times at Alice Smith; certainly enough to send our son James there in 1967 when he was aged 3, to become the first of Alice’s second generation pupils.