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goes by the name veron (english) or wanting (chinese). a definitive leo born august 1, 1984. a solo traveler. loves cats, coffee, sensual music, yummy food and technology. when she's not at her job as an IS developer for the government, she's likely to be out dining, or visiting an interesting art gallery or event.
as promised, here’s part 2 of my feature on the singapore heritagefest 2007 flagship exhibition, which i title “childhood memories“. (and here’s part 1: household things!) this particular exhibition takes place at suntec city mall.
for me personally, the highlight of the exhibition was seeing all the various items and toys from my childhood. i know many of you would find these things familiar, especially if you grew up in the 1980s or 1990s. this list should interest you too.
firstly, my most favorite…
the colorful kuti-kuti! this is one of my favorite childhood toys, not because it is so darn fun to play with (it isn’t really), but the colorful transparent pieces in various animal shapes simply look so adorable!
this is how you play with kuti-kuti (from the singapore museum shops website):
Two players, or two groups of players, would take their turn in flicking with one finger (known in Malay as “kuti”) these colourful little animal-shaped tokens, aiming to land their piece on top of the opponent player’s to win the game.
more childhood games such as the five stones which are made from cloth and sand. my mom played with these in HER childhood!
colorful plastic puzzles! i had both of these! the empty slot is there so that you can slide the letters or numbers to rearrange them in the correct order.
this handheld game from casio was a total classic! it’s called “western bar”. your cowboy character enters the bar to shoot and break the plates and dishes while avoiding any that may drop onto his head. it was a very fun and highly addictive game (with an ending music that i dreaded hearing each time i lost the game).
the red, blue, green and yellow board game above was pretty common when i was a kid, although i never did find out how it was played. a friend tried to explain the rules and objectives to me recently, and made it seem like the most pointless game ever (too pointless to be true)!
would someone please tell me the name of this game and how it’s meant to be played?
ahh… who can forget the simple playing cards like old maid, donkey, happy family and snap? they bring back fond memories indeed.
the colorful chapteh (an asian shuttlecock game)! the boys in my school used to play with it.
do you remember brushing your teeth alongside your classmates during recess breaks back in primary school? we used to rinse out of these colorful plastic mugs! mine was the yellow one, complete with the words “clean teeth never decay” in gold!
by the way, do you notice something interesting about the toothpaste?
instead of the current “darlie” toothpaste that we’re all familiar with, there was a time when it was called “darkie”! a friend told me that this name and the logo of the smiling dark-skinned man were deemed racist back then. hence the name was changed and logo modified to make it more racially sensitive!
this is a more detailed backstory on the darkie/darlie saga for those of you who are interested.
moving on…
i found these condensed milk labels very interesting. they were printed on reused paper; the back of these labels had a whole bunch of other text and pictures on them.
what’s the story behind the condensed milk? did schools order it for school children in the past? for me there had always been chocolate and strawberry milk packets, or even milo. but never condensed milk.
oh! i remember those colorful pencil cases very well. they had all kinds of interesting buttons and different compartments in them. the more there were, the more bragging rights the owner had!
the blue ink erasers would frequently rub holes onto the thin pages of the brown exercise books! those cheap made-in-china wooden pencils were the norm back then. i think they cost just 10 or 20 cents apiece.
here’s a timeline on how writing media has evolved over the years, from the graphite pencils in mid 1600 to the iphone of today!
while we’re at it, here’s another timeline for the evolution of music media
(both timelines are photographs of posters that i found at the exhibition.)
these are things used during the physical education classes in school.
at the exhibition, there was a large table with crayons and paper. kids could draw freely with their creative juices!
the drawings would then be pinned up on the “memory wall”, just like a classroom wall!
before i forget, there is also a barber on hand giving cheap haircuts to men and boys, reminiscent of the street barbers in the past. an adult haircut costs just $3 while a kid’s haircut costs $1! he gives only ten haircuts a day though.
so, are you intrigued yet? head down to the heritage exhibition at suntec city mall then! it runs ’til this sunday! there are also a whole slew of other activities taking place at various venues across the island.
i cannot wait to check out those other activities! time is running out though, so do hurry!
also in this series
July 25, 2007: Singapore HeritageFest 2007 (Part 1): Household Things
possibly related posts
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The game’s called “Airplane Chess” or “Fei Ji Qi”. Yes, these games do bring back memories of growing up in the 80s and 90s.
My Primary School was Jin Tai Primary… we’ll squat over the drain grille to brush our teeth after “Recess” and just spit into the drain.
“Western Bar” was my favourite game growing up - never did realise that its build by Casio.
Thanks for bringing back all the memories, Veron. :D View all comments by Miccheng
This post is worthy for submission to Yesterday.sg !!
Oh ya, I remember having to brush teeth alongside classmate, and I didn’t like it, because the activity of brushing teeth is so regulated…..as part of the school’s programme.
Pardon me, I don’t know how to play kuti-kuti, care to share more about it?
About Darkie, a friend told me that she didn’t dare to brush her teeth after seeing the fierce looking Darkie. I think Darlie is a more friendly version. *winks* View all comments by py
Miccheng: Oh yes, those checkers had airplanes on them. But how do you play it? Tell me next time!
py: I meant to submit this post (and the previous one too) to yesterday.sg, until I realised that noelbynature had already blogged about it over there!
Kuti-kuti is really just like finger-wrestling with plastic animals! You take an animal and your friend takes an animal. Using just your index finger, you try to flick/flip one animal over the other. Whichever animal is pinned down is lost to the opponent. The game continues until one player has lost all his animals! View all comments by Veron
Suddenly the music of the western bar game rang up in my mind, complete with the 2 gunshots at the end. It used to be a market place with gunshots ringing everywhere in the classroom whenever the teacher is not around in the primary school days.
Vaguely remembered collecting those Milkmaid condensed milk labels. Think can exchange for something … can’t remember clearly.
Wahahah …. those were the days. View all comments by noah
Veron, the objective of the aeroplane chess is to be the first (or at least not be the last player) to send all the 4 aeroplane checkers to the ending point. You roll a dice and the number you rolled determines how many steps you can advance. If your dice point is just right, there are short-cuts that you can take towards the ending point. If your opponent’s checker comes to the same slot as your checker, he can kick your piece back to the starting point and you start all over again. My mum loves this game. hahaha View all comments by noah
omg omg super nostalgic! I remember I used to have those pencil case with that magnetic catch, and those blue rubber always rub a hole in the paper!
ok i’m getting old =P View all comments by chillycraps
noah: You could exchange those Milkmaid labels for free gifts? Wahaha that’s cute.
Thanks for explaining the rules of the airplane chess! I may have to play it for myself to see what it’s like.
chillycraps: So am I, chilly. So am I. View all comments by Veron
Western Bar rocks man. I remember the crying sound-effect well, always kana one. Haha :P View all comments by hucks
Wow! Is this festival held annually?
Such a waste I’m not in SG to be able to attend it. :( But great pics and entries! :D View all comments by Jasmine
the aeroplane chess in chinese which we called last time is ‘tiao fei ji’. =) View all comments by lorewang
@lorewang: i’d always thought that “tiao fei ji” meant hopscotch… :D View all comments by Miccheng
hucks: lol at the crying sound effect! I forgot all about that! The cowboy character would have tears pouring off his cheeks too hahaha!
Jasmine: Thanks! Yup, this is an annual event.
lorewang: I didn’t know that! Thanks!
Miccheng: For some reason “tiao fei ji” just sounds dirty to me lol. View all comments by Veron
There was an old Singapore Drama Series by (the then) Singapore Broadcasting Corporation - its called “Five Foot Square” that reminisces those growing up years.
The Chinese theme song mentions all the games that children played back then… “tiao fei ji… da shui bang! Dong fen xi pao zua mi chang”. This song will be inevitably sung at every year’s National Day Parade. View all comments by Miccheng
Hey, I know that song! (Those three lines, at least.) It’s very catchy! Is the second line “da shui bang” (water sticks?) or “da shui zhan” (water war)? I remember it as “da shui zhan”. View all comments by Veron
Wow, those items really brings back some of my childhood memories.
Just to share my personal experience about the toothbrush and the colorful mugs …
Every Friday, my class would fill up our mugs with water at the nearby basin, then lined up along the drain and squatted down …
As I was brushing my teeth, i always seemed to be confused whether the horrible stench came from my mouth or the drain that everybody was rinsing/spitting in … View all comments by Jayson
A few people mentioned the entire class brushing their teeth by the drain and collectively spitting in afterwards. Yuck! What a load of pollution! My classmates and I did it by the large wash basin.
I think that horrible stench came from the hole that isn’t the drain :P View all comments by Veron
Wow! I didn’t think that we also played similar games when we were children (I’m from the Philippines).
I do remember playing Five Stones and Chapteh, brushing my teeth with my classmates after eating (recess and lunch). And those cute pencil cases! Yes, I had a bunch of them, along with colorful erasers and pencils.
*sigh… great memories. View all comments by Augel
Looks like the Five Stones and Chapteh were common to many South-East Asian countries!
Speaking of the colorful erasers, I remember the boys at my school collecting them too. The erasers had green on one side, and a picture of a country flag on the other. Every eraser had a different flag on it! It was quite educational. View all comments by Veron
the red, blue & yellow board game. I used to play that when i was a kid, before i moved to Australia. But can’t rem how to play it. lol
Yeah and the old school stationaries. i rem that we used to collect erasers n play this eraser game. Whoever wins gets to keep their opponents eraser. So like i have a ton of eraser collections when i was young. lol. View all comments by alex from billiondollarwebsites.com
Yeah! That eraser game was played in the same way as the kuti-kuti too! View all comments by Veron
Ah yes… my mistake - it is “da shui zhan”. View all comments by Miccheng
I’ve lost plenty of erasers (and pocket money) to my classmates…
One would think that an eraser with bigger surface area will trump everyone…. but noooo… its the dirty and puny ones that seems to own the day… :D View all comments by Miccheng
To Miccheng:
Yes its the dirt erasers that always seem to win. lol may be coz they’re bigger in size.
To Veron:
Yeah and ther’s also a version where the kids play with bottle caps. Can stil rem those days when me n my cousin would walk from coffee shop to coffee shop collecting bottle caps;)
miss those fun dayz View all comments by Alex from billiondollarwebsites.com
i like five stones.
I used to like make my own five stones using green beans =) View all comments by lorewang
do anyone of you remember ‘da gou bang’?
This is usually make from rolling up newspaper =) View all comments by lorewang
you guys have so much stuff to share. go to mystory.heritagefest.org.sg to write down some sweet memories and stand to win some cash prizes! View all comments by mantou28
Miccheng: lol still feeling sore after all these years?
Alex: I think those old dirty erasers won because they were more rugged. Bottle caps? That’s new to me! (Or old, whichever.)
lorewang: What do people do with the “da gou bang”?
mantou28: I would enter but I’m too lazy! View all comments by Veron
??? (da gou bang) ? Is it like whacko ? You roll newspaper into rod shaped and try and hit people who will be dodging you. Whoever gets hit will become the one whacking other people ? View all comments by noah
lol that sounds very likely! I wonder why the heck is it called ? “?” ?? View all comments by Veron
Yeah… i want my Singapore flag rubber back!
I had quite alot of pencil cases back in my day… the same multi-compartment types… i probably had enuff to switch pencil cases everyday! Ha ha… View all comments by Miccheng
noah - Yes. It is called da gou bang.
Veron - many players will sit in a circle to play this game. One of them will hide the rolled up newspaper behind one of the players and whacked he/she if they didnt pick up the newspaper to chase after you, before the whacker sit down. View all comments by lorewang
Oh, THAT game! Very familiar and not just limited to childhood memories. I think it’s still currently a popular activity at kids’ gatherings and orientations in schools! View all comments by Veron
[...] Sparklette’s post on our Childhood Memories, reminds me of an incident in my [...] View all comments by Miccheng : Lazy Serial Entrepreneur - » Childhood Dreaming (Part 6): Losing A Friend’s Game
Another great post on Singapore HeritageFest. Nice work there Veron and really appreciate your help. Hope that you managed to catch some of the other highlights. Well, there are always lots of events and exhibitions at the various museums around Singapore even after Singapore HeritageFest. ;)
BTW, will be seeing you on Wednesday for the New Media sharing session chaired by Melvin Yuan. I don’t know what I am going to talk about yet but its gonna be a speech without any powerpoints for me. Too freaking busy!! View all comments by walter
hi i enjoyed the read View all comments by Amelia
Hello
Very interesting information! Thanks!
Bye View all comments by hiutopor
the red, blue, green and yellow board game where im from is called (ludy) it is very easy and fun..an i would appreciate how i could get my hands on 1 of those i been searching all over for it View all comments by dai dai
I remembered there were some games like:
1. Zero point by using rubber bands to make a string and jump across it. I was really amazed when a person was able to jump so high especially when the string of rubber bands was above the head.
2. Marble game. Everyone will contribute 1-3 marbles and we will draw a circle around the marbles. Then we will use our marbles on hand to hit onto the group of marbles. If any marble roll out from the drawn circle, it will become his and he could take it away.
3. Humtum balla. We will use a tennis green ball and hit onto a person. Anyone who pick up the ball can hit onto another person. The ouch factor is high if being hit by the ball!
4. Zombie game. I forgot how this was played but vaguely remember there’s such a game. It was like a touch and run game.
The games that we used to play were interactive in a way that we are able to interact with one another. Those were the days! View all comments by Ivalingel
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