I do not have any enemies

The Chinese version was posted by KY on NYHK on 22 Jan 2010.

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After graduation I stayed on as a lecturer at Beijing Normal University. On the podium, I was a popular teacher, well received by students. I was at the same time a public intellectual. In the 1980s I published articles and books that created an impact, was frequently invited to speak in various places, and was invited to go abroad to Europe and the U.S. as a visiting scholar. What I required of myself was: both as a person and in my writing, I had to live with honesty, responsibility and dignity.

Subsequently, because I had returned from the U.S. to take part in the 1989 movement, I was imprisoned for “counter-revolutionary propaganda and incitement to crime,” losing the platform which was my passion; I was never again allowed publish or speak in public in China. Simply for expressing divergent political views and taking part in a peaceful and democratic movement, a teacher loses his podium, a writer loses the right to publish, and a public intellectual loses the chance to speak publicly, which is a sad thing, both for myself as an individual, and for China after three decades of reform and opening up.

Thinking about it, my most dramatic experiences after June Fourth have all linked with courts; the two opportunities I had to speak in public have been provided by trials held in the People’s Intermediate Court in Beijing, one in January 1991 and one now. Although the charges on each occasion were different, they were in essence the same, both being crimes of expression.

Twenty years on, the innocent souls of June Fourth do not yet rest in peace, and I, who had been drawn into the path of dissidence by the passions of June Fourth, after leaving the Qincheng Prison in 1991, lost in the right to speak openly in my own country, and could only do so through overseas media, and hence was monitored for many years; placed under surveillance (May 1995 – January 1996); educated through labor (October 1996 – October 1999), and now once again am thrust into the dock by enemies in the regime.

But I still want to tell the regime that deprives me of my freedom, I stand by the belief I expressed twenty years ago in my “June Second Hunger Strike Declaration” — I have no enemies, and no hatred. None of the police who have monitored, arrested and interrogated me, the prosecutors who prosecuted me, or the judges who sentence me, are my enemies. While I’m unable to accept your surveillance, arrest, prosecution or sentencing, I respect your professions and personalities, including Zhang Rongge and Pan Xueqing who act for the prosecution at present. I was aware of your respect and sincerity in your interrogation of me on December 3.

For hatred is corrosive of a person’s wisdom and conscience; the mentality of enmity can poison a nation’s spirit, instigate brutal life and death struggles, destroy a society’s tolerance and humanity, and block a nation’s progress to freedom and democracy. I hope therefore to be able to transcend my personal vicissitudes in understanding the development of the state and changes in society, to counter the hostility of the regime with the best of intentions, and defuse hate with love.

As we all know, reform and opening up brought about development of the state and change in society. In my view, it began with abandoning “taking class struggle as the key link,” which had been the ruling principle of the Mao era. We committed ourselves instead to economic development and social harmony. The process of abandoning the “philosophy of struggle” was one of gradually diluting the mentality of enmity, eliminating the psychology of hatred, and pressing out the “wolf’s milk” in which our humanity had been steeped. It was this process that provided a relaxed environment for the reform and opening up at home and abroad, for the restoration of mutual love between people, and soft humane soil for the peaceful coexistence of different values and different interests, and thus provided the explosion of popular creativity and the rehabilitation of warmheartedness with incentives consistent with human nature.

Externally abandoning “anti-imperialism and anti-revisionism,” and internally, abandoning “class struggle” may be called the basic premise of the continuance of China’s reform and opening up to this day. The market orientation of the economy; the cultural trend toward diversity; and the gradual change of order to the rule of law, all benefited from the dilution of this mentality of enmity. Even in the political field, where progress is slowest, dilution of the mentality of enmity also made political power ever more tolerant of diversity in society, the intensity persecution of dissidents has declined substantially, and characterization of the 1989 movement has changed from an “instigated rebellion” to a “political upheaval.”

The dilution of the mentality of enmity made the political power gradually accept the universality of human rights. In 1998, the Chinese government promised the world it would sign the the two international human rights conventions of the U.N., marking China’s recognition of universal human rights standards; in 2004, the National People’s Congress for the first time inscribed into the constitution that “the state respects and safeguards human rights,” signaling that human rights had become one of the fundamental principles of the rule of law. In the meantime, the present regime also proposed “putting people first” and “creating a harmonious society,” which signaled progress in the Party’s concept of rule.

This macro-level progress was discernible as well in my own experiences since being arrested.

While I insist on my innocence, and that the accusations against me are unconstitutional, in the year and more since I lost my freedom, I’ve experienced two places of detention, four pretrial police officers, three prosecutors and two judges. In their handling of the case, there has been no lack of respect, no time overruns and no forced confessions. Their calm and rational attitude has over and again demonstrated goodwill. I was transferred on June 23 from the residential surveillance to Beijing Municipal Public Security Bureau Detention Center No. 1, known as “Beikan.” I saw progress in surveillance in the six months I spent there.

I spent time in the old Beikan (Banbuqiao) in 1996, and compared with the Beikan of a decade ago, there has been great improvement in the hardware of facilities and software of management.

In particular, Beikan’s innovative humane management based on respecting the rights and dignity of detainees, implementing more flexible management of the will be flexible to the detainees words and deeds, embodied in the Warm broadcast and Repentance, the music played before meals, and when waking up and going to sleep, gave detainees feelings of dignity and warmth, stimulating their consciousness of keeping order in their cells and opposing the warders sense of themselves as lords of the jail, detainees, providing not only a humanized living environment, but greatly improved the detainees’ environment and mindset for litigation, I had close contact with Liu Zhen, in charge of my cell. People feel warmed by his respect and care for detainees, reflected in the management of every detail, and permeating his every word and deed. Getting to know the sincere, honest, responsible, goodhearted Liu Zhen really was a piece of good luck for me in Beikan.

Political beliefs are based on such convictions and personal experiences; I firmly believe that China’s political progress will never stop, and I’m full of optimistic expectations of freedom coming to China in the future, because no force can block the human desire for freedom. China will eventually become a country of the rule of law in which human rights are supreme. I’m also looking forward to such progress being reflected in the trial of this case, and look forward to the full court’s just verdict — one that can stand the test of history.

Ask me what has been my most fortunate experience of the past two decades, and I’d say it was gaining the selfless love of my wife, Liu Xia. She cannot be present in the courtroom today, but I still want to tell you, sweetheart, that I’m confident that your love for me will be as always. Over the years, in my non-free life, our love has contained bitterness imposed by the external environment, but is boundless in afterthought. I am sentenced to a visible prison while you are waiting in an invisible one. Your love is sunlight that transcends prison walls and bars, stroking every inch of my skin, warming my every cell, letting me maintain my inner calm, magnanimous and bright, so that every minute in prison is full of meaning. But my love for you is full of guilt and regret, sometimes heavy enough hobble my steps. I am a hard stone in the wilderness, putting up with the pummeling of raging storms, and too cold for anyone to dare touch. But my love is hard, sharp, and can penetrate any obstacles. Even if I am crushed into powder, I will embrace you with the ashes.

Given your love, sweetheart, I would face my forthcoming trial calmly, with no regrets about my choice and looking forward to tomorrow optimistically. I look forward to my country being a land of free expression, where all citizens’ speeches are treated the same; here, different values, ideas, beliefs, political views… both compete with each other and coexist peacefully; here, majority and minority opinions will be given equal guarantees, in particular, political views different from those in power will be fully respected and protected; here, all political views will be spread in the sunlight for the people to choose; all citizens will be able to express their political views without fear, and will never be politically persecuted for voicing dissent; I hope to be the last victim of China’s endless literary inquisition, and that after this no one else will ever be jailed for their speech.

Freedom of expression is the basis of human rights, the source of humanity and the mother of truth. To block freedom of speech is to trample on human rights, to strangle humanity and to suppress the truth.>>

I do not feel guilty for following my constitutional right to freedom of expression, for fulfilling my social responsibility as a Chinese citizen. Even if accused of it, I would have no complaints. Thank you!

Central Bank to the World

Last week, I came across a news article that made me gasp with amazement. http://www.nytimes.com/2010/12/02/business/economy/02fed.html

It is easy for everyone to forget too quickly how close we all got to the end of the global financial system. This article lay it bare for any one with an understanding of how global finance works to realize how lucky we managed to get off the hook; and who we have to thank. The United States Federal Reserves.

Put simply, in early autumn on 2008 the global financial system froze. There was no more money in the system because no one trusted anyone else anymore. The market for commercial papers which operate like a gigantic overdraft facility for corporations needing short term cash flow were empty. No commercial company - no matter how large or solid or profitable - was considered safe. No bank would trust another bank.

Financial and non-financial corporations holding on to securities/collateral in return for loans suddenly found no takers for what they were holding. Without a ready and liquid market, the value of most instruments were plunging quickly towards zero for all intents and purposes. As their value diminished, lenders call in more security or call in the loans which choke off the oxygen for the commercial borrowers.

Companies like Caterpillar, Harley-Davidson, General Electric, McDonald’s, Toyota and Verizon were gasping for air as everyone was pulling in their liquidity. It was a run on the banks except they are corporates.

It was not just American corporates who found their oxygen cut off. Banks from all over the world were lining up in the firing line. Royal Bank of Scotland, Barclays, UBS of Switzerland; Mizuho Securities of Japan; and BNP Paribas of France all joined Citigroup, Merrill Lynch, Goldman Sachs and Morgan Stanley.

Who else could step in but the Fed? One can complain ceaselessly about their ridiculously unfair power to create US$ out of thin air - and doing so seemingly at will - but in this case, they lived up to the great responsibility that came with this unique ability. It's quite astounding when you consider the time pressure with which they had to act and the reckless courage with which they acted. Any delay or second-guessing and the falling dominos will turn into an avalanche. Warren Buffet in his recent article "Thanking Uncle Sam" said as much.

The Fed stepped in as the buyer of last resort for these markets and provided obscene amounts of liquidity in return for whatever assets the borrowers could show up with. Like a paramedic, the Fed was pumping the chest and administering CPR and giving its blood to everyone else.

In total, the Fed stepped in with US$1500 billion into the commercial papers market and US$9000 billion in short term loans to financial institutions. Not only that, the Fed extended US$2000 billion in swap lines to other central banks. The European Central Bank drew the most but nine other central banks also made use of them: Australia, Denmark, England, Japan, Mexico, Norway, South Korea, Sweden and Switzerland.

The cumulative total sum that the Fed bet on the survival of the global financial system is more than $12 Trillion or about the size of the US Federal debt or 22% of the GLOBAL GDP. All of that, and relentlessly so, within a matter of months. And fortunately, it got all the money back with interest as the underlying borrowing corporations are fundamentally sound and the actions kept the dominoes standing. The fact that it worked is clear from the often dismissive attitude some people have begun to take to the financial crisis of 2008.

You might have heard of people accusing that the seriousness of the 2008 crisis was over-stated. No, the fact is that it was vastly under-stated. Vastly. Were the Fed a little slow, a little hesitant, a little less courageous, a little unlucky, a little picky about who gets the money or a little more self-interested (after all, the US is gambling with its own net-worth to save everyone in the system) the global economy - Europe, China, India, SE Asia, Latin America, Japan - would very well have cratered into a downward spiral. In that world, people would be praying for what we have right now.

So credit where credit is due. No pun intended.

What Do Economic Recoveries Feel Like?

Pundits, journalists and, often, the man in the street follow the herd instinct. The implication being that just like the stock market, the conventional wisdom often swing from one extreme to another. From over-optimism to over-pessimism. From over-buying a never-ending boom to over-selling the doom and gloom. The reason why a perfect market do not really exist even with perfect information is that the cognitive powers of human beings are wired to be self-affirming. In other words, we see whatever that proof us right and clever, and discount everything else that are to the contrary.

As an investor, I am forever tuning my senses so that I remember what it felt like when the world was coming to an end (Asia circa 2H 1997, Sep 2008), or when things are getting worse and will never recover (1998), Oh-my-god! we didn't see this one coming (SARS 2003, 9-11 2001, Lehmans 2008), "Wow! I can't believe every part of the world is booming" (Dot-com 1999, 2007), or "this time it is different" (every boom and every recession). Having all these gut-memory means knowing how to react the next time it happen. That is what makes a better investor.

I could even remember the early 1980s when Ronald Reagan was the worse and dumbest President ever...that the recession and unemployment would never end...deficits doubled...that Japan is kicking America's butt and this time its different. I was - what, 10 or 12 at the time? Then I remember reading about rising productivity and economic growth, the 1984 Los Angeles Olympics and suddenly it was sunrise in America. Same thing later around 1993, how US recovery snucked up while everyone was besotted with Asian Dragons. Back in 2000 in Malaysia, I remember people investing, spending and buying property while the world media were still doing capital controls and Anwar etc. Same with Indonesia and Thailand which was booming by 2003 even when the debris of the 1997 Asian Financial Crisis were still attracting all the attention. Moral of the story is that media is always reactive and and on hindsight.

The point I am getting to is that the US economy is in the middle of a significant and sustainable recovery - and this point will become obvious according to conventional wisdom around April or June 2011.

As of this month, the financial markets have recovered to pre-Lehman level (it has been close since March 2010). The stock market is usually the leading indicator. In the past quarter, the nominal size of the US economy has also begun to exceed that on the eve of Lehman Brother's implosion. In fact, by the end of September, it is 1.7% larger than in September 2008.

For the past few quarters, (Main Street) US corporate earnings have repeatedly been beating expectations. In fact, large numbers of corporations have record earnings for 2010. US corporations are reporting explosive growth in export earnings - accelerated no doubt by the weaker dollar and by demand from large parts of the world where economies are booming. Unlike in the past, to see the full picture one has to look beyond US, Europe and Japan. Corporate forecasts and earning guidance are being revised upwards - and guidances are usually conservative to ensure surprise when they report their results - so reality could be even stronger.

US corporations are now sitting on record cash reserves. When the recession began, corporates were overly aggressive in slashing their stock levels. As a result, there was massive restocking in 2009 that pulled Chinese economic recovery into record territory. China is the leading indicator in the global supply chain: the fact that China grew mightily throughout 2010 is a good indicator of what US retailers really expect on consumer demand at the end of this year. Apart from stock levels, I believe corporates also over-slashed their head count: one sign, US economic productivity continued to grow throughout the recession, which means employment was cut even deeper than production i.e. demand. Productivity, hours worked and total wages continued to grow as economy recover but employers try to squeeze more work out of existing workers. Part time workers are going up, seasonal workers for the holiday season is going up. I noticed that for the past few months, while the pundits have been focused on the current month's payroll and unemployment numbers the numbers for the preceding months were always being revised upwards. Last Friday when the news was all about the net increase of 151,000 jobs for October, less noticed was that August and September numbers were revised upwards 80,000+. That under-counting shows that the initial estimates have been too cautious. That is a good sign for recovery overall. I see the end of this year could see the tipping point when new hirings and new corporate investments return with a vengeance. Such is recovery when it happens.

Plenty can still go wrong of course. I am cautious about ill-timed cut-backs by state and local governments. The housing market is still anaemic (but not as sick as middle of the year) and de-leveraging takes time. Some European economies can still fall back. But one thing I learnt is that lately most of the bad things people worry about did NOT happen: remember Greece dragging Europe into a recession? Remember the fears of a double-dip? Remember the fears of China losing steam in early 2009? And, I believe, eventually so will the fears about deflation (and inflation) and many more fears and nerves along the way.

In fact, there will be new fears for pundits and journalists to warn about even as the papers report 4% growth, millions of new jobs in the US next year amidst continuing momentum for growth.

Extremist Anonymous

Last weekend I read a lengthy FT article on a rouge and destructive extremist group that believes it is in a life-and-death struggle against the evil US Government.

The rag-tag army of adherents nurse their grievances and extreme sense of victimhood that many would find irrational. As far as they are concerned, and according to the vapid propaganda and information outlets (often online) that prevail in their world, they are victims fighting for their way of life against the encroachment of corruption and evil in the world.

They are fervent religious believers. Moreover they share a belief in recreating the glories of a perfect (mythical) past during the time of their Founders - wise and noble leaders who are divinely inspired. Their revel in historical imageries and mimic the dressing and their Founders. They believe that the weaknesses and corruptions of current society are all due to deviations from the perfected rules and ways of life as practiced by the Founders. Hence, they believe that society must return to a literal interpretation of the document that encapsulate the original rules of their Founders.

They do not have a centralized leadership structure, but they have a central inspirational figure who plays the role of agitator-in-chief, with a cast of preachers who keep the fire burning amongst the foot-soldiers through the air-waves.

They are often caricatured as unsophisticated and bewildered losers in the dislocations caused by the globalized economy; but many of them actually come from privileged circumstances. In fact, they are often funded by shadowy wealthy people. They are crafty manipulators of media attention on them, giving them an influence and presence that is exaggerated.

They have no doubt everyone else who question them are to be defeated; especially fellow adherents who are moderately inclined or question too much. They spice their arguments with pseudo-facts and conspiracy theories that are constantly being circulated within their communities by an army of bogus experts and preachers - the purpose being to spread fear and fervor. Either way, they have all sorts of "evidence" to show that anyone who do not follow their way are on the path of the doomed if not damned. Hence, they are impervious to science, facts, reason or logic.

Who are they? They are the Tea Party of course.

Future Conventional Wisdoms

A few daring predictions - or rather cutting through the conventional wisdom that we see in the media circa 3Q2010 that stands in the way of seeing reality. In no particular order:

(1) Britain lurches into a recession in early 2011 - and possibly bringing Europe into one. One simply can't cut 8% off government spending (or approx. 5% of the GDP worth of consumption) - and 500,000 jobs, or increasing the unemployment level by 20% - without having some sort of impact on a weak economic recovery. Interest rates are already low and whatever boost in confidence from fiscal prudence will not compensate for lower demand. The Coalition government's cuts will - on hindsight - be seen to be foolhardy.

(2) Barack Obama finds himself (still) popular - The media will wake up from the meme of Obama losing popularity, by realizing that he has a really stable bed-rock of following that stays resilient no matter what. Since Jan 2008, he has polled around 45% when faced with Hillary and later against McCain. Only when he was flushed with victory in late 2008 and early 2009, he rose above the 50% mark. It is remarkable that given the state of the country and the wringers he has been put through for the past 2 years, Obama's numbers essentially remained unchanged. This is the bedrock that propels him to a second term. The world will also concludes that he remains the best they can expect and deals with him on that basis.

(3) Global economies in steady and sustainable recovery - Behind all the feelings of impatience over the momentum of economic recovery and fears of a double-dip, conventional wisdom is missing out very real recoveries in the booming BRIC and emerging economies which led to recoveries in Europe and the US (where corporate profits are beating expectations, farm prices breaks record and exports booming). The only road bumps are self-inflicted (see Britain above).

(4) Green technology undergoes a breakthrough - Behind all the glum after Copenhagen Climate Summit, the key to permanently reducing our carbon footprint will come from a series of innovations that breaks out much like the internet in the 1990s; and take the world by surprise. Although where it will emerge is be unpredictable, the under-pinnings are all there: a combination of national competition, strategic government-led investments in science, internet-speed linkages and collaboration, market forces from demands in the emerging markets esp. China and India and China's manufacturing prowess that lowers costs.

(5) China makes quiet moves towards internal democracy - Beneath the official caution and reflexive oppression, the Chinese society moves into a level of prosperity, personal liberty and maturity that evolve into quiet progress on political reform, that takes place as experiments and in a piece-meal manner in the more advanced provinces and cities. The next decade will be remembered as a balancing act between political reform and struggles to contain dangerous nationalist tendencies (from the majority and not just from minorities).

(6) Water replaces CO2 as the environmental issues of the day - As with CFCs in the 1990s, acid rain in the 1980s, CO2 will be overtaken as the environmental issue of the day by water. Structural changes in the supply and demand of water in Middle-east, India, North-China, Southwest US and Australia will trigger a new global crisis and consciousness about living with less water. On the other hand, changes in the weather pattern will bring too much water to many parts of the world - whether from hurricanes, torrential monsoons and rising sea levels - will spur water related innovations and engineering. Water technologies and supply commands a premium. China exports its hard-won desertification fighting and tree-planting know-how as green technologies.

(7) Asians are the new Westerners - After 200 years, Asians will be considered the global elite - bringing together the same mix of envy and resentment. In many parts of the world, East Asians are already considered the "new white" as the establishment or the social elite. This mentality will spread to the West itself.

(8) Gas becomes competitive with oil - The perfect storm of 4 factors: massive reserves of non-traditional gas in the developed world coming on tap, glut in LNG capacity and resulting plunge in tradable gas prices, drive for cleaner energy and expansion of electricity into transportation conspire for gas to first replace coal in power generation and oil in transportation. Because gas requires massive, bankable long term investments, the expansion of gas encourages progressive, stable and responsible governments in the Middle-east.

(9) Turkey joins BRIC and emerges as an economic powerhouse that Europe finds increasingly difficult to ignore but equally hard to embrace. Turkey forms the new nucleus of influence to be reckon with that stretches from Eastern Europe to Central Asia and the Levantian Middle East. This revives in economic and political terms the old Ottoman sphere of influence of a billion people ignored by Europe and out-of-reach of the US, China or India.

(10) America gets transformed - again - by its army of new Asian and Hispanic immigrants that lifts it away from becoming Latin America (income and socio-economic inequality, entrenched special interests, oligarchic centers of power and decline) and its Western-dominated worldview into a mightier version of Canada (progressive, open, diverse). Future historians would notice a reassertion of America's historic Asiatic/Pacific cultural and ethnic links after a period of when European connection dominates.

The last farewell to my wife — Lee Kuan Yew

It is apt to let his own words to speak for his grief.

October 06, 2010

Oct 6 — 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 practiced 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 oneterm 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, athriving 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 eatingup 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.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.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.

LKY's Grief

I will let the words speak for themselves. The man has a lot to teach even when he grieve. Its not easy to know what sentiments and feelings go through the minds of elderly Chinese man like him, so it is refreshing that he allowed himself to be vulnerable and share his feelings.

It take some courage for the older generation to get our of their reserved and unsentimental shell. So it helps to think of other older relatives in our family and begin to understand a bit more about what they are feeling too, as they age, in times of illness and when they grief for a long loved one.


From the NYT, 10 September 2010.

Days of Reflection for Man Who Defined Singapore
By SETH MYDANS
SINGAPORE

“SO, when is the last leaf falling?” asked Lee Kuan Yew, the man who made Singapore in his own stern and unsentimental image, nearing his 87th birthday and contemplating age, infirmity and loss.

“I can feel the gradual decline of energy and vitality,” said Mr. Lee, whose “Singapore model” of economic growth and tight social control made him one of the most influential political figures of Asia. “And I mean generally, every year, when you know you are not on the same level as last year. But that’s life.”

In a long, unusually reflective interview last week, he talked about the aches and pains of age and the solace of meditation, about his struggle to build a thriving nation on this resource-poor island, and his concern that the next generation might take his achievements for granted and let them slip away.

He was dressed informally in a windbreaker and running shoes in his big, bright office, still sharp of mind but visibly older and a little stooped, no longer in day-to-day control but, for as long as he lives, the dominant figure of the nation he created.

But in these final years, he said, his life has been darkened by the illness of his wife and companion of 61 years, bedridden and mute after a series of strokes.

“I try to busy myself,” he said, “but from time to time in idle moments, my mind goes back to the happy days we were up and about together.” Agnostic and pragmatic in his approach to life, he spoke with something like envy of people who find strength and solace in religion. “How do I comfort myself?” he asked. “Well, I say, ‘Life is just like that.’ ”

“What is next, I do not know,” he said. “Nobody has ever come back.”

The prime minister of Singapore from its founding in 1965 until he stepped aside in 1990, Mr. Lee built what he called “a first-world oasis in a third-world region” — praised for the efficiency and incorruptibility of his rule but accused by human rights groups of limiting political freedoms and intimidating opponents through libel suits.

His title now is minister mentor, a powerful presence within the current government led by his son, Prime Minister Lee Hsien Loong. The question that hovers over Singapore today is how long and in what form his model may endure once he is gone.

Always physically vigorous, Mr. Lee combats the decline of age with a regimen of swimming, cycling and massage and, perhaps more important, an hour-by-hour daily schedule of meetings, speeches and conferences both in Singapore and overseas. “I know if I rest, I’ll slide downhill fast,” he said. When, after an hour, talk shifted from introspection to geopolitics, the years seemed to slip away and he grew vigorous and forceful, his worldview still wide ranging, detailed and commanding.

And yet, he said, he sometimes takes an oblique look at these struggles against age and sees what he calls “the absurdity of it.”

“I’m reaching 87, trying to keep fit, presenting a vigorous figure, and it’s an effort, and is it worth the effort?” he said. “I laugh at myself trying to keep a bold front. It’s become my habit. I just carry on.”

HIS most difficult moments come at the end of each day, he said, as he sits by the bedside of his wife, Kwa Geok Choo, 89, who has been unable to move or speak for more than two years. She had been by his side, a confidante and counselor, since they were law students in London.

“She understands when I talk to her, which I do every night,” he said. “She keeps awake for me; I tell her about my day’s work, read her favorite poems.” He opened a big spreadsheet to show his reading list, books by Jane Austen, Rudyard Kipling and Lewis Carroll as well as the sonnets of Shakespeare.

Lately, he said, he had been looking at Christian marriage vows and was drawn to the words: “To love, to hold and to cherish, in sickness and in health, for better or for worse till death do us part.”

“I told her, ‘I would try and keep you company for as long as I can.’ That’s life. She understood.” But he also said: “I’m not sure who’s going first, whether she or me.”

At night, hearing the sounds of his wife’s discomfort in the next room, he said, he calms himself with 20 minutes of meditation, reciting a mantra he was taught by a Christian friend: “Ma-Ra-Na-Tha.”

The phrase, which is Aramaic, comes at the end of St. Paul’s First Epistle to the Corinthians, and can be translated in several ways. Mr. Lee said that he was told it means “Come to me, O Lord Jesus,” and that although he is not a believer, he finds the sounds soothing.

“The problem is to keep the monkey mind from running off into all kinds of thoughts,” he said. “A certain tranquillity settles over you. The day’s pressures and worries are pushed out. Then there’s less problem sleeping.”

He brushed aside the words of a prominent Singaporean writer and social critic, Catherine Lim, who described him as having “an authoritarian, no-nonsense manner that has little use for sentiment.”

“She’s a novelist!” he cried. “Therefore, she simplifies a person’s character,” making what he called a “graphic caricature of me.” “But is anybody that simple or simplistic?”

The stress of his wife’s illness is constant, he said, harder on him than stresses he faced for years in the political arena. But repeatedly, in looking back over his life, he returns to his moment of greatest anguish, the expulsion of Singapore from Malaysia in 1965, when he wept in public.

That trauma presented him with the challenge that has defined his life, the creation and development of a stable and prosperous nation, always on guard against conflict within its mixed population of Chinese, Malays and Indians.

“We don’t have the ingredients of a nation, the elementary factors,” he said three years ago in an interview with the International Herald Tribune, “a homogeneous population, common language, common culture and common destiny.”

Younger people worry him, with their demands for more political openness and a free exchange of ideas, secure in their well-being in modern Singapore. “They have come to believe that this is a natural state of affairs, and they can take liberties with it,” he said. “They think you can put it on auto-pilot. I know that is never so.”

The kind of open political combat they demand would inevitably open the door to race-based politics, he said, and “our society will be ripped apart.”

A political street fighter, by his own account, he has often taken on his opponents through ruinous libel suits.

He defended the suits as necessary to protect his good name, and he dismissed criticisms by Western reporters who “hop in and hop out” of Singapore as “absolute rubbish.”

In any case, it is not these reporters or the obituaries they may write that will offer the final verdict on his actions, he said, but future scholars who will study them in the context of their day.

“I’m not saying that everything I did was right,” he said, “but everything I did was for an honorable purpose. I had to do some nasty things, locking fellows up without trial.”

And although the leaves are already falling from the tree, he said, the Lee Kuan Yew story may not be over yet.

He quoted a Chinese proverb: Do not judge a man until his coffin is closed.

“Close the coffin, then decide,” he said. “Then you assess him. I may still do something foolish before the lid is closed on me.”


'This house will be empty' That was how Minister Mentor Lee Kuan Yew put it when he spoke about his wife's inevitable passing in an interview with The Straits Times for an upcoming book.

Q: How are you coping with her illness?
A: We can't choose how we go. It's a difficult way of going but life is like that. So I've adjusted and accepted the inevitable. The doctors say even though you expect it when it happens, it's still a blow. I can only wait and see, and I've mentally sort of prepared myself... But there will be another adjustment when she finally isn't here. Then this big house will be empty. Fortunately I'm able to concentrate on my other work, so life goes on.

Q: Who do you turn to if you're feeling a bit down or you want somebody sympathetic to talk to?
A: I would say my wife.

Q: And now? Do you go to her bedside to talk to her?

A: I do that every night. I read to her, I tell her what I've been doing for the day and the news of the day from The Straits Times, IHT and Wall Street Journal. Then I read her the poems that she likes and has flagged over the years.

Q: She can't speak. How does she convey how she feels to you?
A: She blinks. 'Yes', one blink; 'no', two blinks.


· Can we start by asking how is Mrs Lee and how difficult is it for you coping with her illness?

Well, at the beginning it was. When it happened in May last year it was traumatic...She had recovered from her first stroke in 2003, reasonably unimpaired. We dashed her to hospital - the National Neuroscience Institute. There they found a new bleed (in the brain), this time in a more difficult position where it affects the movements. But there was still hope that she would recover with some physiotherapy, although maybe the quality of life would not be as good as before. Then while she was undergoing therapy, within the first two weeks she had two more strokes, one after another. The doctor said it's no use, physiotherapy cannot do anything because it was traumatic. So we brought her home, and I had to shift into my study room, which is next to my bedroom, because she had to have nurses round the clock. All the trauma meant I could not sleep. I developed a heart flutter and all sorts of problems that may have come on a few years later but came on earlier because of the stress.

After a while you adjust yourself mentally. I can do nothing except provide good nursing, so I've resigned myself. So have my children. She's gradually losing more and more of her faculties. There must have been more minor bleeds. Now she has cognition but she can't speak. But that's life. I was thinking to myself when I fell off the bicycle recently - had I knocked my head against the floor, I would be in a similar condition. We can't choose how we go. It's a difficult way of going but life is like that. So I've adjusted and accepted the inevitable. The doctors say even though you expect it, when it happens it's still a blow. I can only wait and see, and I've mentally sort of prepared myself.

It also reminded me of my own mortality and how quickly it can change in the flicker of a second if there's an internal bleed. That's life. I cannot choose how I'm going to go. I just carry on my life and that's that. If you start thinking about it, you will go downhill. Every day is a bonus, so let's carry on.

· Is she conscious of what's happening around her? Can she recognise...?

I'm the one she recognises the most. When she hears my voice, she knows it's me. This is after 62 years together, which makes it more difficult for her and for me. Because there's full cognition - when I tell her, look, our daughter is in hospital with some problem, she's suddenly alert and listens. But the hours of cognition are becoming less and less because she's sleeping more and more. Energy levels go down...

I have to psychologically make adjustments. I've adjusted. But there will be another adjustment when she finally isn't here. Then this big house will be empty. Fortunately I'm able to concentrate on my other work, so life goes on. I travel and do all the things I have been doing. If I don't carry on with life, I will degrade. If you think you're going to sit down and read novels and play golf, you're foolish - you'll just go downhill. Every day is a challenge. Every day has problems to be solved.

· Who do you turn to if you're feeling a bit down or you want somebody sympathetic to talk to?

I would say my wife.

· And now? Do you go to her bedside to talk to her?

I do that every night. I read to her, I tell her what I've been doing for the day and the news of the day from The Straits Times, IHT and Wall Street Journal. Then I read her the poems that she likes and has flagged over the years.

· She can't speak. How does she convey how she feels to you?

She blinks. Yes, one blink; no, two blinks.

· What were some of the best times you had as a couple?

Well, my greatest joy was when my wife won the Queen's scholarship and I managed to get her into Cambridge immediately after that, because that meant she didn't have to wait for me for three or four years in Singapore. Had she not got a scholarship, I'd have gone back (to Singapore) in three years and finished the bar exams as soon as possible. Before I left, she had said, after three years we will become strangers to each other. I said, no, we won't. In the end, she took a risk and so did I, because we might have drifted apart. She got the scholarship, I got her a place and we got married that December (in 1947) quietly in Stratford-upon-Avon. Then we came back and remarried again in 1950. I don't think that's an offence (laughs), to marry a woman twice, the same woman!

· What would you say is the secret to a long and happy marriage?

First of all, we accommodated each other. There was nothing we fundamentally disagreed on. She knew my quirks and I knew her eccentricities. She's a voracious reader. She read Horace, the Iliad and Gibbon's Decline And Fall Of The Roman Empire. She read books on fishes, on food - the books on her bookshelf at home. I'm not interested in those subjects but she is. I'm interested in what I am doing. In the case of my memoirs, she would read my drafts and would simplify the English to make it easier to read and understand. Because as a conveyancing lawyer she's particular about the meanings of words, they should be clear, they should be simple. As a result, she influenced my writing style. I used to write convoluted sentences, the way I speak. She says, no, no, speaking is all right because you can repeat yourself and you can pick up where you left off. But in writing, you write a sentence and you move on. So you make it clear and crisp. If you look at my writings before my memoirs, my written style has more loops. She cured me of loops. She said, you want this to be read by O-level students. Don't use multisyllable words when you can use a single-syllable word, which is what (British style guide writer) Ernest Gowers advised. It was good advice. One of my doctors told me, I read your book and I found it very simple. So my wife succeeded. We adjust to each other.

· How else did she influence you?

In almost everything. I left the domestic chores to her. She runs the household and the maids. Now I have a problem. I got a man who fixes things up and looks after the maids. It's not satisfactory because he doesn't know what the maids do in the bedroom and it's not cleaned as before. It's a problem. I have to get my sister to teach the cook because my daughter is not interested in these things. She's interested in her work and writing the next article and her BlackBerry. Her cooking is to take raw salmon and put it in the microwave. My wife is a good cook and she gave instructions to the maid on how to cook.

She'll know when something is not right. She's got highly sensitive taste buds and sensitive nostrils. She can tell straight away, oh, you've put too much lengkuas (galangal) and so on, reduce it. I would not have known what was wrong. I just knew it didn't taste good. She would know. I miss all that. Life goes on. Now my sister helps to train the cook. She's a good cook. Life means adjustment. We make do after a while.