The Evolution from wannabe "Baby Malaysian Idols" to the SSP Radio Show

My mom and dad are truly ingenious parents. Most parents will just be trigger happy and snap every single moment of their children’s daily activities on camera. My parents were just as trigger happy as other parents... but being such creative parents they ALSO recorded our voices on tape. The microphone must have been the most amazing invention in the world… at least to three excited children back then.

I really enjoy listening to myself and my brothers on tape belting out nursery rhyme tunes repeatedly… we must have sounded like broken records… all day long it was just “tinkle, tinkle, ‘ittle ‘tar, ‘ow I wonder what you are” or “baa baa black theep ‘ave you any wool”

Another thing we just LOVED to do was to tell fairy tales… Top on the list was Little Red Riding Hood, followed by The Three Little Pigs and Goldilocks. Picture how animated we were as we passionately squeaked Red’s exclamation “grandmother, what big teeth you have!” and in the gruffly voice of the wolf “all the better to EAT you with, my dear!!!” The gruffly wolf voice was also used in “I’ll HUFF, and I’ll PUFF, and I’ll BLOW your house down!!!”. What power we held in those four magic words: "Once upon a time..."

The second recording we had was one July morning before school (afternoon session). Dad was at home that morning. Sam and I sang songs we learnt in school… Paul was still at the “twinkle, twinkle little star” stage… Paul had just turned two years old in January that year. So he was still the annoying toddler that wanted to butt into everything and kept trying to wrestle the mic from his older siblings. So our performances were interjected with phrases like “I want it, I want it”, “It’s my turn”, and “Stop it, Paul”. But Paul had his exclusive air time at toward the end when he was the subject of big sis’s interview questions asking his name (Paul’s reply: Pauuuuuuul”), his age (Paul’s reply: Twooooooo) and his residence (Paul’s reply: Taman Kim Leeeeeeeng”). Sigh, he was so cute… WE were all so cute!

The third recording we had was by the SSP Radio Station. We were older and more advanced by then… so you can imagine how interesting this show was. I played a couple of musical pieces on the piano… and so did Sam (self-composed pieces in fact – one I remember titled as “The Princess”). Paul told a joke – why did the chicken cross the road. Sam did some Thomas Edison “thing” (until now I still cannot really understand what his Thomas Edison “thing” was). And of course there was Sam and Paul’s “Chicken Hawk” and “Chicken Mackumbay”