The College in the 60s

I still remember my confusion as I stepped out into the harbour of Jesselton from a cargo ship from Singapore . Eventhough I didnt suffer seasickness from the 5 day crossing of the rough South China Sea, I felt groggy and was trying to balance myself as I step into the moving street of Jesselton, as Kota Kinabalu was still called then. It was night when I arrived at Kota Kinabalu, and there was quiteness and almost no life. I walked the street from one end to another and past midnight I went back to the bunk of the cargo hold to sleep.

The next morning as I peeked through the porthole of the ship hulk , I saw small boats from Gaya Island and some coolies beginning to work on the pier. I packed my meagre belongings, said goodbye to the deckhands and walked to town to look for the education department of Sabah that promised to take me in as a temporary teacher. A man named Yahya told me I could teach a school in Kota Belud and straighaway he put me into a Land Rover to my next destination.

Kota Belud was a small town then. The people were exclusively Badjau with some grocery shops operated by the Chinese. The people still used kerbau and horses to move about.The school was run by an old New Zealander who married a local. He assigned me to teach English and Maths to students who were as old as I was ( I was 17 then).

After 3 months at Kota Belud, and beginning to know more people in the town, I was asked by the education department to enrol into Gaya Teachers' College to be trained as a teacher. I have no plan to be a trained teacher, but as there was no promise of an exciting life in Kota Belud, I took the next Land Rover to Gaya College.My journey to Sabah via Singapore on a cargo steamship was out of curosity and done impulsively to get out of the cacoon I had been in my kampung. I thought Gaya College wouldnt be a bad place for a teen like me to burn my energy and keep my andrelin level under control.