THE MEMOIRS OF MUSTAPHA HUSSAIN - Malaysia Today

78 Memoirs of Mustapha Hussain
One day in class, he asked in a low voice, “Is there a communist
among you?”
Standing up boldly to represent the class, I responded, “We are not
fools and are not stupid enough to be communists.”
To that he asked, “How do we know? Even your uncle may be a
communist.”
Mr Dawson was saying all this very softly because he did not want
Mr Mann, the Principal, a very strict Englishman, to know of such
exchanges. On another occasion, I heard a Kedah student, Mahmud bin
Osman, shouting at Mr Dawson, “You can go back to your own country!”
I did not know what preceding discussion had so angered the Malay
student.
I think Mr Dawson was misled. He thought students in Malaya were
as politically conscious as students in Canadian colleges. Maybe it did
not dawn on him that politics was not one of the subjects as freely
discussed in Malaya as it was in Canada, that had already attained
Dominion Status in 1867. After getting to know Mr Dawson closely, I
learnt that he was a very liberal person who did not believe in colour
bars. After that incident with the Kedah student, he stopped talking about
politics. Perhaps he had also received an earful from the British officers.
Entertainment
We had opportunities to play soccer on a medium-sized field near the
school. We often lost to well-known teams from other schools, but never
too badly. Were we to be given a bigger field and more practice, we would
have become a team to be reckoned with.
There were also two badminton courts. Abu Bakar bin Manan and I
were the inter-house doubles champions. But when we played with the
Sunnydale Club, we lost terribly. Sunnydale already had excellent players
in 1928. It is no surprise that Malaysia has produced stars like Ng Boon
Bee, Tan Yee Khan, Tan Aik Mong and Tan Aik Huang.
For three days after pay-day, the school was deserted. The Indian-
Muslim canteen we patronised daily was deserted. Even students who
cooked their own meals would be out. The leftover rice in their pots
developed a green mould, a kind of fungus suitable as a specimen in
class.
On moonlit nights, we took strolls in the Lake Gardens where we
sang and plucked our guitars. In this department, the Johore students were
incomparable. But when it came to jokes and making people laugh, the
Penang boys were the natural champions.