Mrs Seah was 11 years old when the war broke out. From Alor Star in Northern Malaya the family travelled to Taiping, Perak. They went into the forest to hide, with provisions of 'fried rice (rice padi which were dried and fried)' and drank from stream water. Many of the family members fell ill and her sister got very sick and nearly died.
When the British surrendered, they lost everything they had, their house was looted and they had to stay with their grandmother. Life was difficult under Japanese rule and they lived in fear. But they became independent, as the Japanese made everyone go out and work. She attended Japanese school for one to two hours every day and had to work the rest of the day.
The girls had to cut their hair short and dress up as a boy for there was the danger of rape. She had a close shave with a Japanese soldier, luckily a kind Korean working in the Japanese Army warned them and they hid underwater in the river to escape from the Japanese soldier.
Link: http://library.thinkquest.org/C002071/interviewseah.html
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