A Visit to Ignatius Chew Museum - Kim Tan Discovers Her Roots

At the Chew Museum. Kim Tan with hubby Danny Cheung and daughter Naomi

It took one visit to the Ignatius Chew museum for Kim Tan to realize that her family was large.

  

Kim Tan lives in Singapore and visited Ipoh recently. It was a casual visit with her husband Danny Cheung and daughter Naomi to savor Ipoh’s good food and to find some family history.

Not unexpectedly it was ‘family history’ which became the interesting point of the trip after visiting the museum.

She described it as a surprise for her while her husband was ‘very impressed’ and her ‘7 year old daughter Naomi was excited and fascinated that the family was popular’.

Kim Tan is the grand-daughter of Yeoh Ghim Seng, the son of Yeoh Khuan Joo and Winnie Khong Sau Meng the daughter of illustrious Dr Khong Kam Tak

“My grandparents were from Ipoh and moved to Singapore 70 years ago and settled there. I have never stayed in Ipoh. My grandmother Khong told me stories about Ipoh but they were just names without pictures.

She described her grandmother now 99 years old as very alert for her age and does a lot of things on her own.

Before I came up to Ipoh I researched about the museum and its location. I hadn’t announced my visit and on the day when I dropped by I was lucky that Ignatius was on hand to open the door and explained the family to me.

Going through the museum I never realized I belonged to such a big family, much too large for me to remember all the names.  

Kim described the museum as very interesting and informative and discovered that both her great-grandfathers have street names named after them.

I visited the homes of my great grandparents. Sri Maju office’s was where my Yeoh great grand parents lived. The staff very kindly allowed us to go upstairs of the building.   

Naomi at Sri Maju the former home of her great great grand parents the Yeoh's.  

A road name of another great great grandfather, Dato Khong Kam Tak in Ipoh

Sadly the Khong family home that used to be on Gopeng Road was torn down and is now an Indian restaurant. I took pictures and videos at both locations to show to my grandmother.

Kim thanked Ignatius for putting in the long hours to piece together the family tree and plans to visit again next time hoping to get in touch with more relatives and of course to savor the Ipoh food.

JAG

DJY (Datin Janet Yeoh) Charity Team – Doing Good For Community

Datin Janet Yeoh (standing 7th form left) with the DJY Team and Orang Asli residents. Patrick Ong (standing 2nd from right in white cap) and Sean Chan (front row 1st from right)

A month ago I was alerted by my charity activist friend Patrick Ong, who mainly aids the Orang Asli (OA) families around the Kinta Valley, of a group distributing aid at Tg Tualang.

“Today v had a successful trip to OA Kg Ayer Tenak, Tg Tualang ..with superstar's mama leading her team wearing t-shirts with d logo, DJY …Datin Janet Yeoh came in her Porsche!... She tried riding on my old Proton Arena! What an experience 4 a grand old mama in her 80s! … 80 packs, comprising, cooking oil, soap, slipper, bee hoon, colgate n 10kg rice, was distributed to d poor.+ clothes” … read a text from Patrick.

The DJY Team came with came with Sean Chan (a member of DJY) and his ESS Engineering team of ten staff. Their contribution was 4 wheel drive vehicles to carry the goodies and proposed to fix the wiring for three OA houses.

Distribution time at Kg Ayer Ternak, Tg Tualang. (Left pix) Patrick Ong and Datin Janet . Some of the 80 packs of goodies..

Several stops were made to distribute the goodies

The DJY Team and the team from ESS Engineering with a resident from Kg Ayer Ternak.

That ‘superstar mama’ which Patrick was referring to was Datin Janet Yeoh, the mother of international actress Tan Sri Michelle Yeoh.

I had so far seen Datin Janet in evening dress handing out prizes and this was a first seeing her in trousers handing out goodies to the Orang Asli.

I subsequently contacted Datin Janet herself and discovered that DJY team was now 4 years old.

Janet who is 80 this year said at the time she was free at home and needed something to occupy her time. That was when she decided to start a charity.

“I am old but I can walk, think and still can come out to help people so I started DJY Charity Team.

It’s a small team of just 13 members. We contribute Rm100 a month including my daughter Michelle and do charity in cash and kind every month mainly to the Old Folks Home.

Sean Chan, of ESS Engineering said the trip to the Orang Asli was an annual affair.

The Team pose with their DJY T-shirts

..and at their 4th Anniversary dinner earlier

“We always will work with Patrick who knows the OA families and their needs. DJY Team will donate the major portion and ESS will contribute with cash and kind like logistic support and expertise to contribute to the community of orang asli”.

Overall it’s a fun and win-win outing on a weekend for everyone including my staff.

JAG