PETALING JAYA: Former station master Tan Kim Seng said in its glory days, Malayan Railways (KTM) was the heart of the nation’s transport system.
Now 79 years old, he said: “I was born in 1943 during the Japanese Occupation. I don’t remember having ever seen my father. I don’t know what happened to him, but my grandmother and mother told me he went out to look for work one day and never returned.”
Tan said his family lived with his grandfather, who worked as a general worker in Kampung Jawa, Klang.
“Back then, education was not compulsory and most were not interested either. Life was hard. Towards the end of 1961 when I completed Form Five, I immediately started to look for work.
“In 1962, I was offered a job in KTM as a temporary clerk. At the time, all the ports were under KTM, and I was posted to Port Klang to work at a warehouse.”
Tan said he earned RM5.12 per day back then.
“In 1963, I was offered a permanent position as a clerk in KTM with a monthly salary of RM127. I was attached to the cashier’s office,” he said, adding that his main job was to collect fees paid by lorries that went to the port to collect cargo.
On July 1, 1963, the Port Klang Authority (PKA) was established and the port management was separated from the railway operations. Staff were given a choice to work with PKA or stay
with KTM.
Tan opted to stay with KTM and in 1965, he was sent to train at the Petaling station for a month, followed by another six months at a training school to qualify as station master.
In 1968, he was sent to Lenek in Johor to work at a one-man station. It had no utilities, water or electricity. Only one train stopped there each day to cater to the nearby Orang Asli community.
“I depended on the Labis and Bekok station masters, who were Malay and Indian, to send me vegetables and supplies,” he said.
Just three months after being posted to Lenek, Tan was reassigned to Bukit Abu in Kelantan. He said the railway men’s families were very close-knit, and including an estate manager, there were only three Chinese families in total.
But all of them got along superbly with the Indians and Malays.
“We were just like one big family,” he said.
However, being cut off from any communication and news from outside of the station, Tan said he was not aware of the race riots that took place on May 13, 1969.
“I was not aware of what was happening since nothing was amiss in Bukit Abu. When the Malay families in the area told me: ‘Don’t worry, nobody will harm you’, I was curious to know what they were talking about. I had no radio, television, or other means of communication. Getting a copy of a newspaper was very rare, and that too only if the trains bring one,” he said.
Tan went to Klang on May 14 to see for himself what was happening in the country. Along the way, he stopped in Kuantan, Pahang, and noted that everything was peaceful there too. Hence, he concluded that the riots were merely isolated incidents that did not represent the anger or views of any particular race.
In 1974, Tan was transferred to the Kuala Lumpur station.
“I became a commercial representative and met a lot of people. I realised that writing official letters and minutes of meetings in Bahasa Melayu would not be easy because of the transport-specific jargon I had to use,” he said.
In light of Malaysia Day on Sept 16, Tan calls on the people to always prioritise unity regardless of one’s race or religion.
“We built this nation as one people. Every one of us did our part to make Malaysia united and prosperous, and we should never forget that.”