Clicker Cricket

This innocuous little clicker toy was featured in a show about flea markets on TV recently. An antique shop in China Square had a whole bin full of it.

This toy is made out of tin and a steel blade. When depressed, the steel blade makes a cracking sound that's not too different from a large cricket.

During my childhood, this toy was cheap and provided many hours of distraction. There were many designs to choose from: Frog, Cicada, Cowboy and others. Oh, we also used the toy in spy games when the clicks would indicate a 'Yes' or a 'No'. I guess our teachers found us a handful when the clickers started going off in class. We would get caned of course, or be smacked on the hand with a ruler and have the clicker confiscated. We would then beg for it to be returned after class.

I remember one time the sharp corners of a clicker caught the fabric in my shorts pocket and caused a tear and a hole; I was in Primary Two then. My glass marbles inside fell out. From then on I kept the clicker in my shirt pocket but I would worry that it might poke through my shirt and into my heart. To play it safe, I kept the clicker in a match box in the end. It did feel adult to be carrying one of those picture matchboxes around!

Years later I would encounter this clicker again in the SAF. Some instructor suggested we use it to produce a kind of field communications code. We tried it for a while but found it predictable. What if the enemy used the same as a decoy? We knew at the time that it had been used in WWII before by some airmen during Operation Overlord. They were of a particular design and issued to members of the RAF. If a bunch of these airmen were downed with an aircraft and parachuted everywhere, a clicker was more discreet than calling out, "Hey, where are you guys?" It's especially so when it is night and in pitch darkness.

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A Western Education

A movie like Cowboys and Aliens (now showing in the cinemas) should appeal to me - someone who enjoys Westerns as well as Sci-fi; it is like the best of worlds. But I am not rushing to see it yet. Somehow, the two (cowboys and aliens) seem at odds with one another. A typical Western runs at a languid pace, the vistas span the horizon larger than life. The reluctant hero speaks little. And when there is a stand-off, the characters squint and look at each other for a long time - no one wants to be the first to twitch. Even flies get bored and fly away.

The alien movie, on the other hand, thrives on confined spaces  often to create a sense of foreboding. Space might be huge but it has no horizon, so you don't really have an affinity for it. If its blackness does not suffocate you, the boredom will after a while. The aliens don't typically move at Usain Bolt pace; they tended to drag their sorry asses (or whatever appendages the director deemed fit to put on them) along. Aliens that move at a fast pace simply look like ants. What's so scary about that? They should hide in tight spaces and surprise you when you least expect. Drooling even, in anticipation. An alien in a Western setting would just go beserk. It will soon scurry and hide under a rock or cave. Open land spaces scare aliens, why they seldom survive. Unless they happen to crash in an area known as Area 51. There they would be kept alive and probed, just like the recent smart-mouth alien, Paul, in the movie, er, Paul.

A love for westerns
My love for Westerns grew, I suspect, from watching one too many as a kid. In the 60s and 70s, there were  plenty of them on Singapore TV - mostly in black and white. There was Gunsmoke, Rifleman, Have Gun - Will Travel, The Big Valley, Zorro, Bonanza, and The Wild Wild West.

I enjoyed them all because even though they were of the same genre, they each offered something different.

Everybody needs a 2nd chance
In Gunsmoke, James Arness was the leader, a marshal who treated everybody with equal fairness even if you were a native Red Indian. That showed a universal respect for human rights and above all, that justice should prevail regardless of skin colour. Red Indians in the show (now given more lines than the token "How, kimo sabi"  speech) became more believable. The show also gave starring roles to 'coloured' actors. I saw for the first time blacks dressing as successful persons other than just slaves or labourers. It told me that you might be a minority race but if you had the flair and the smarts, you could be your own person. Another aspect of this show I found intriguing was the character of Kitty. She worked in a saloon and you could guess that she was a call girl of sorts, always having a soft spot for the Arness character, Marshal Matt Dillion. As a kid, you don't see her in any sexual way (ok, maybe her buxom did) but as the companion and good person that she was. She gave that "oldest profession in the world" a human face. Really, as a man, your confidante need not necessarily be your best drinking mate or spouse. A woman can play that role too.

As a  Western, I found Gunsmoke immensely different, maybe why it ran as long as it did. It didn't treat the Old West as the usual place: an idealised outpost of pioneer versus native, or as a wham-bang 'shoot-em-up' place. Every week, the situations were realistic, the themes adult. Probably the doctor character, Doc Adams, best sums up the show: not everything in the West is what it seems. Each person has his or her own back-story, one that he/she might be desperately trying to forget. And in arriving at Dodge City, everybody is equal and start afresh. How cool is that?

Another character in Gunsmoke that was quite unforgettable was that of Festus. His whiny and nasal voice might be irritating but it is kudos to the actor himself that it came across as one of compassion and folksy humour. From him, I learnt not to judge a person like I would a book cover. Even idiosyncratic people can be fun and relied on in a pinch. He was indeed the most unlikely of law enforcement deputies.

Violence not the answer
In Rifleman, I was at first enthralled by that rapid fire weapon. That's how the show always begun. But as you watched on, you realised that Chuck Conners wasn't a man who liked violence. He often conveyed this to his son. And surprisingly, he seldom if at all carried a six-shooter - quite odd for a Western or a man living in those times. The show brought home the fact that it must have been tough growing up without a mom. And that as a single kid with no siblings, you had only your parent as your world. I was glad I had a brother and many sisters, even if we quarreled some of the time. And in a pioneer setting, having a kin mattered a lot. Although the Chuck Conner's character came across as independent, I realised that to survive, no man can be an island. Chuck Conners also had a face and physique that was hard to forget and he stayed in my memory for a long time. You could say he was my first action hero. An "ang-mo" (foreign) hero, that is.

Gun justice for hire
Have Gun - Will Travel, I remember for a variety of reasons. First, the opening song: "Have Gun Will Travel reads the card of a man. A knight without armor in a savage land. ...Paladin, Paladin, where do you roam. Paladin, Paladin, far far from home." I think it was sung by Pat Boone. I would hum it cycling. Paladin gave me the first indication that I could leave home and make a career of being a gun for hire - albeit for good. And for many days, I would dream of being independent and travelling to troublesome places. I even made up a business card just like Paladin. But mine featured a rabbit instead of a chess knight. Rabbit was my zodiac sign (or so I thought).

I also drew Paladin's chess knight emblem on the back of my erasers. Paladin was almost the anti-hero. He read books, showed a preference for salons with nice draperies, and attended theatre. He might be in a Western but he took time to change into nice duds whenever an event called for it. Paladin liked the good life in an understated way - a gentleman of principles with firepower strapped to his leg. Travel, do good things, any decent boy would love that!

Strong woman
The Big Valley was a girl's Western (as my sisters will attest). It starred actress Barbara Stanwyck as a feisty ranch owner. At the time, this was quite unusual as many of the stories on TV had women mostly in housewife roles such as Father  Knows Best, My Three Sons, and even Bewitched. Stanwyck's character showed that as a widow with children you could still pick up the pieces after a husband/breadwinner's death. She was no lame dame and many a time, she had to fight off greedy businessmen intent on acquiring her ranch - legally or otherwise. She battered sexism, she battered intimidation. Stanwyck wasn't the most alluring actress at the time but in her role, she came across as classy, smart, and tough. I think there was a good man who pined for her attention. There always is in this kind of story.

A fencing good time
No kid can forget Zorro, why the studios went and made a movie starring Antonio Banderas in 1998. By then, we were all adults nearer the side of forty. Is that the age when we hanker for remakes? Zorro I remember mostly for his mustache, fencing and that fat soldier who was always trying to catch him without any success. Zorro was no different from Robin Hood in his altruistic nature. But his need to keep his identity secret was an incredible hook to millions of fans. The show was actually very slapstick and utterly predictable. For a long time, I hankered for a sword like Zorro's only to find out at a 2nd-hand goods store near Newton Circus that an actual blade weighed like a ton (esp. to a scrawny kid like me).

Family drama out West
Of all the Westerns, Bonanza was perhaps the most famous. This could be due to its stars, who went on to helm other popular TV shows such as Little House on the Prairie (Michael Landon),  Battlestar Galactica (Lorne Green) and Trapper John, MD (Pernell Roberts). I think in Bonanza, especially for boys, one could identify with the kind of personality you were with the sons of the patriarch Ben Cartwright.

Little Joe (Landon) was young and impetuous. Horse (Dan Blocker) was warm and gentle, almost innocent (and girl shy). And Adam (Roberts), was the level-headed one in the family. Bonanza wasn't so much the typical Western but a family drama set in the so-called Wild West.

In Bonanza, the stories were rather predictable. But because of the three boys and what they stood for, they often got into scrapes. It is usually a result of protecting the modesty and chastity of a girl they happened to come across. Another popular theme was run-ins with cattle hustlers. The Cartwrights showed lots of chivalry and righteousness, but not always in the most astutest of  manners. They seemed to tell me that as boys, it was alright to fight (even with fists) for what's right - the sort of thing that appealed to young, idealistic boys.

Happy skirt chasers
Wild Wild West I liked for their inventiveness and quirky humour. Somehow, action men with a sense of humour appealed to me as a kid. You could be starring in the face of death but without a sense of humour, death was usually swift. Might as well have that last laugh, was my motto then. Later, Roger Moore of James Bond fame reminded me much of Robert Conrad, the lead in Wild Wild West. Both liked chasing after women and charming them with humour.

Linda Purl - what a cat
Later on, besides Little House on the Prairie, there was another impactful TV series about a pioneering family called Young Pioneers, starring Linda Purl. Me and my fellow male classmates were quite taken by her. To us, she was the epitome of the good woman who needed protection from a strong, reliable guy. Pretty yet chaste, sweet yet tough, willing yet weak. Well, at least that's how the show portrayed her and how we fantasized about it. Haha....Later, Jodie Foster came onto the scene and we thought how similar the two were in looks and stature. Calista Flockhart (Alley McBeal) even more so. But she was SO whiny.

Fave westerns
My favourite Westerns are The Good, The Bad and The Ugly, and Unforgiven. For alien movies, it is the Alien series and The Thing, which will have a prequel showing in Singapore later this year. Looking at these movies, you can see why a movie like Cowboys and Aliens would not work; not as an actioner anyways.

I think The Thing comes closest to being a Western with its desolate landscape, isolated community and idiosyncratic characters each with his own emotional and social baggage. There was also the stand-off between the alien (infected people) and those who weren't.

Mr Strong Silent Type
I admit unashamedly that I like Clint Eastwood and his spaghetti Westerns. They remind me of a time when all a man needed to go places was a horse, a blanket, a six-shooter, a canteen and a Stetson. And yes, a pot of coffee and lots of beans. I have no issue with beans as I can eat them for breakfast, lunch and dinner. But only the small beans though. They are less raw and more flavourful. There's a simple recipe to make them even more delicious right out of the can!

Playing Cowboy & Indians
Like the other boys my age growing up in Geylang, I too had a holster set of toy pistols, bullets and badge. Man, that sheriff badge was precious, especially if it was metal. Me and my siblings played Cowboys and Indians often. To make our pretend wagon, we would face two of our wooden living room chairs back to back and drape a blanket over. Sometimes, that doubled as a teepee.

During our time, the bow and arrows we had were made of cane, not plastic. We didn't have two, so we would use 'lastic' instead. Lastic was a weapon with paper v-shaped bullets shot off with rubber bands. For additional guns, we made them out of two interlocking pieces of paper.

Ultraman
As for aliens, we didn't know of any then, only the ones that bothered Ultraman. They were actually more like pests, the way they pop up and destroy stuff. Ultraman the Pest Remover. Haha, who knew!

Eat and Play

That sandy patch next to my school canteen (see blog Big Field Wild Fence) was where we played games like skipping, marbles and sa ku lei often during recess. Skipping was played mostly by the girls whereas marbles and sa ku lei were played by the boys. But we did have a dialect-speaking girl who was very good at sa ku lei.

Two types of marble games we played. One involved a tough, beige colored marble that was about 1.5 inches in diameter. The other game involved colorful small glass marbles commonly found in fish tanks and containers of water-based plants such as the Money plant. 

The tough marble was called goli or tua goli (big marble). You play a game with it from a heel-sized hole in the ground. The game was simply called Goli and this was how we played it: To start, a line is drawn some distance away from the hole (depending on how big the playground is). Players then try to roll their golies into the shallow hole. The one whose goli enters or lands nearest the hole will start. The one who lands furthest away will become the 'pasang' (target) fella. The starter picks up the pasang goli and drops it at arm's length in front of himself (or whichever direction he so desires). He will then try to knock the goli with his own. If he manages a direct hit, this pasang goli would be knocked some distance away.

The pasang fella then picks up his goli and tries to throw it back to the hole. If he succeeds, the game is over. If not, the next person gets a chance to go at it. If on throwing back, the pasang goli lands not in the hole but a foot or less away, this becomes a "jat" situation. In this case, the next person to hit will have to stand with one leg erect (in the hole) to hit the pasang goli. He can hit the goli in any way he likes - such as between his legs, which was common.

Every hitter must keep a leg in the hole. If he fails to do so, his hit will be disqualified and the pasang goli is replaced and the next person will then have a go.

Golies for this game often came in two types: The tough beige ones and the weaker white ones. The white ones were slightly bigger but more fragile, hence cheaper. They often split into two when hit hard (which made me wonder why buy it at all!). Another way to hit harder and further is to wrap the goli in a handkerchief and swing it like a slingshot. It wasn't a nice thing to do as it seemed like bullying the poor pasang fella! But then, pasang is pasang!

We often bought our golies from a vendor outside the school back gate. He would come on his tricycle laden with toys, snacks, stickers, etc., to entice us. Much later, I would discover that he graduated to owning a toy/snack shop under a block of flats in Marine Terrace (Marine Parade). Great for him, I thought. He's still there. The shop has turned into a houseware sundry shop. But a corner was keep for toys and stickers. His daughter said it was kept out of his dad's fond sentiment of his pioneering days. How sweet!

Oh, this goli game can also be played with a circle drawn. If a pasang goli is still within this limit, it can still be hit by the next person in queue. Only when the pasang goli has left the circle can it be then thrown back at the hole. Sometimes the pasang fella will opt not to throw his goli back into the hole but somewhere near. He would hope that his goli is not shot at and hence have a better chance of holing it nearer.

The other marble game we played involved the small glass ones. We would place the marbles in a small circle (one foot in diameter?) and try to hit them out. The ones out would be picked up and owned. Everyone would contribute the same amount of marbles at the start. A good hitter will try to spin his scoring marble so that more marbles would be knocked out. It's quite the technique! And if your scoring marble lands in the circle, you have to replace any marble that has been knocked out and give up your turn. If not, you can continue after all the marbles have been owned.

The game starts with two lines drawn some two meters apart with the circle placed slightly after the last line. To decide who starts, each will throw his marble out. The order of play  follows who lands nearest to the line. Touching the line is tops! But if more than one person does that, a second round of deciding will be carried out.

Sa Ku Lei is quite the same. But this time, only two lines are drawn. Two persons compete to see who can throw their coin or washer (the bolt and nut sort) nearest. The one who loses has to carry the other person on his back, pick up the coins/washer (whilst still carrying the victor) and then stand behind the line. He would pass the coins/washers to the person on his back. This person would throw the loser's coin in front and try to hit it with his own. If he succeeds, the loser will have to carry him to the opposite line after picking up the coins/washers (a challenge with the guy still on his back). The game continues until the last victor misses. He then gets off the back of the loser and they can then decide whether to start the game afresh. It is common to find four pairs starting at the same time.

Our canteen also sold toys sometimes, especially those that came with sweets and candies. A particular one I remember (and still own) came with a paper tube of sugared coconut shavings that no kid could resist. The toy itself was a disk held by a loop of string (two pin holes side-by-side in the middle). To start, the loop of string is stretched over the middle fingers. It is then wound up by twirling the disk round and round. Then, by pulling on the now twisted string, the disc would spin and wind again. It's a toy that depends on having a good momentum. Two players could then 'fight' each other by pitting their discs against one another. Most times the fragile discs would chip and break from violent contact. It must seem dangerous today but back then, we didn't worry too much about such things. We simply bought a new one and played on. I think our school later banned the toy. Really, the broken plastic chips could fly into the eyes!

This school ban made this game even more dangerous later. We would make the discs out of flattened bottle caps instead. So instead of fragile plastic, the discs became sharp metal! They could really cut fingers. I would usually use this kind of spinning disc to 'polish' concrete so as to watch sparks fly. I believe this disc game was called Yeh Yeh back then.

One snack that got us all totally hooked was called satay. It's not your typical satay but thin and triangular slices of some kind of sweet, sticky meat on a stick. The meat was some kind of dried fish or jellyfish supposedly BBQed. However, eating them now, they taste full of MSG - maybe why we kids got hooked last time. Still, this snack was utterly addictive. At the time, each stick cost five cents each and we ate it often after school waiting for our school buses. Today, they are sold in fan-shaped packs of a dozen sticks each or so at the supermarkets or shops like Uncle Tidbit, imported mostly from Malaysia and Thailand. (One brand lists the ingredients to include jelly fish, starch, salt, sugar, chillies and vegetable oil.)

Recess time was always a frenzied time of buying food, gulping it down and then play. Because I was very active, my mom would always tell me not to eat the yellow noodles as they were filling and I would get a tummy ache if I ran around. As a result, I often queued up for beehoon (rice vermicelli) in soup instead.

The beehoon soup came with fishball slices and fried shallots. It has a simple but lovely aroma - why to this day I still have a preference for beehoon over the other types of noodles. It'd cost 20 cents for a bowl then. The lady at the Chinese noodle knew me well. I just have to turn up and she knows I would order fishball beehoon!

Another dish I liked in my school canteen was Mee Rebus. Nothing fancy, just yellow noodles and gravy. But it was quite flavourful because the gravy was made with small dried shrimps and topped with taupok and beansprouts. The mee rebus was served up on small enameled metal plates. For some reason, I remember the ones with the colour lilac and red trim best. Because the plate was enameled, parts of it would get chipped and rusted from knocking while washing. They looked rustic and rather charming in that way.

I once had the same kind of simple mee rebus in the 90s, but it could only be found across the Causeway in a row of shophouses just right after the lorry customs on the right next to the sea. Needless to say, it was popular because it was simply delicious!

The other food fetish was curry puff. The lady who sold it would give it to you on a small piece of recycled exercise book paper or tracing paper. On the counter would be a bowl of orange-coloured chilli sauce. We kids absolutely loved to drench the curry puff with this sauce. It's actually a chilli sauce that had garlic and lime in it - something akin to the chilli sauce that accompanies chicken rice today but not quite the same. So far, I only know one place that still serve up this chilli sauce: the snack bar at the canteen in Yishun Polyclinic (the old one next to Khoo teck Phuat Hospital). What a discovery after all these years! Sadly, the proprietors changed after the polyclinic shifted location to be nearer the bus terminus.

For drinks, the most popular and common one was Pineapple Juice. Not the thick concentrated yellow juice that we find in drink cans today (e.g. the Lee brand) but the one that has been diluted and sweetened to a clear yellow-orangey colour and sold in a transparent acrylic tub. At the bottom would be small triangular slices of pineapple to add flavour. Whenever the drinks lady served up her drink, she would first churn the bottom of the tub to unsettle the pineapple slices. She would then scoop the drink and some pineapple slices into the glass (we all drank from glasses with no straws then; hygiene was such). After the drink, the pineapple slices would often stick to the bottom of the glass - why there would always be plastic cocktail forks on hand. There would also be a bowl of dark soy sauce with cut chilli too. Everybody knew at the time pineapple went well with that. With a little added sugar, it was even better!

At the corner end of the canteen was a guy selling cakes/creamed bread buns and kueh-kueh. Cream buns were very popular back then. Kids often snacked on these when there was nothing else to eat. The sweet buttery cream would burst through the centre at each bite. It was a great treat for those of us starved of western buttery delights! If not this, then it was the local bun with coconut filling.

The same stallholder also sold another popular snack that was a precursor to the popular Monster instant noodle snack of the 80s that kids still eat today. This potato stick snack are currently sold in Japan Home and those $2-a-pack biscuit shops. Damn chockful of MSG!

The snack is still the same orangey colour. Instead of short sticks (about 1 cm), it now comes in small puffed squares. During my school time, this snack was packed in small clear plastic packs like most "kiam sern ti" (sour/sweet treats) that were sold. We would bite off a corner to get to the main contents, often in mid-stride running to another recess playtime engagement! Haha!

One popular cake from this stall was a small butter one that is shaped like a chef's hat (see butter cup cake pix below). A small piece of tracing paper wrapped around its middle. But as it was butter cake, this piece of paper often got very oily and unpleasant!

Another popular snack during primary school was a cordial drink frozen in solid ice tubes called "sern pow" (Hokkien). Packed in a thin, tubular plastic bag, you have to bite off a corner end to suck at it. My fave flavour was orange.

A later one was sweet plum with the she mui (salted plum) visible at the bottom. This sern pow was a great bit of ice to suck on and run about with - which we often did. Most shops still sell sern pow with their stick ice cream today but at one time, the plastic tube used was not the same thin polystyrene type. It was thicker and came with its own twist-off tab. Since 2011, I've noticed the old sern pow coming back. It sold for 30 cents, a far cry from the 5-cents we used to pay. In a matter of months this 30-cent price went up to 50 cents - quite ridiculous even in a time of rising food prices.

In class, we had milk. It was part of the school's milk program to help skinny kids grow.

The milk came in individual hand-sized plastic packs that often flopped about in the shallow bin trays that were brought to class on Milk Day. These trays would end up sloshing with spilled milk. The milk packs were white with a silhouette print of a cow. The color of the print would indicate the flavour. There was vanilla, strawberry and chocolate. We kids loved the chocolate and would rush to be the first to get our hands on that. I found vanilla to be quite nice too. I remember strawberry flavour being a little too strong for my liking. But I must confess, sometimes the smell of all that milk in the bin tray made me want to puke.

Yes, recess time was a time we kids looked forward to after some periods of tedium in class. If we got too active, we would return with sweat and grime. We all carried handkerchiefs then, so it was no big deal. Sometimes we washed up in the toilets before going back to class. In those situations, the handkerchiefs came in handy and we would hang them out along the edge of our tables to dry. I sometimes wondered what our teachers thought of that.

Back then my siblings and I got our pocket money on the day itself. It was usually 50 cents (if I was taking the school bus then). I always carried a sling water bottle. After spending 20 cents on a bowl of beehoon, I would still have 30 cents left. That's quite a bit still and I would reserve it for snacks outside of school while waiting for the school bus. In that open space, were quite a number of hawkers.

A man sold his peanut candy bars. The block bars were beaten and rolled out with a large F&N glass drinks bottle. An old lady sold mark ar tong (Cantonese, a kind of twisted malt candy) from a small metal pail. Another hawker couple sold waffles from an iron griddle from a tricycle stall. I loved the waffles but could seldom afford them. The peanut candy was great but they stuck to the teeth too easily. Eating mark ar tong was like licking a lollipop.

Fortunately, I can still get these treats if I want to. An old lady used to sell that mark ar tong in Holland Village, stationing herself and her small metal pail next to that large Indian mama shop well known for its array of magazines. This old lady would twist the malt candy out with two short sticks for a dollar. For the peanut bar, I would get it from Sin Thye Cake Shop along Sembawang Road (just after Khatib Camp). A Hokkien friend was thrilled to discover this place. He had also eaten the same as a child. For waffles, they are sold everywhere nowadays, especially at neighbourhood cakeshops. But there's a distinction: They are mostly pandan flavoured. In the old days they were yellow, unflavoured and crispier. Still, waffles are waffles what with their unmistakable aroma. It's an aroma that brings back sweet, sweet memories of a bygone time!

Next story: An Artful Teacher