THE MEMOIRS OF MUSTAPHA HUSSAIN - Malaysia Today

184 Memoirs of Mustapha Hussain
was still in his Volunteer Force shorts. He told me that he had withdrawn
from the warfront at Bidor, embittered by Australian soldiers’
looting his house.
I pulled Captain Hamid aside and advised him to shed his Volunteer
Force shorts instantly and to stay out of the Japanese way. “Believe me,
Hamid, the Japanese will not leave you alone if they ever find out you
were a Volunteer Force Officer. The least they would do to you is drag
you south with them.” I recounted to him that while in Ipoh, the Japanese
were extremely interested in the name, rank and capability of the most
senior British Army officer in Bidor. Realising how close he was to the
‘tiger’s mouth’, Captain Hamid made himself scarce.
In Tapah, I heard intense hostilities were raging in Slim River, where
British troops had hastily formed another line of defence. Many war
analysts have described this Slim River clash as a decisive one in Peninsular
Malaya. Days later, the Japanese would break through British
defence positions. When British troops withdrew from Slim River, they
virtually lost North Malaya, and the largest city in Malaya, Kuala Lumpur,
lay open to Japanese troops.
In the course of my move with the Japanese, I encountered many
dead bodies of British soldiers, a few in their armoured cars, others strewn
all over the place, but absolutely no sign of Japanese bodies. I wondered
how that could be, until I detected a small, but efficient squad. This group
of Japanese rode on bicycles, just like most Japanese soldiers, but instead
of uniforms, they wore pants and singlets, with a small towel wound
around their necks. In place of arms, they carried small digging spades
and, sometimes, bunches of sawi (spinach mustard vegetable) on their
bicycle handles. While some carefully lifted bodies of Japanese soldiers
for burial, others cleaned the spilt blood of their fallen colleagues off the
streets and vehicles until no trace of blood was left anywhere.
Slim River was, I think, taken on 7 January 1942. Japanese soldiers
were seen taking shelter from explosives and shells in trenches dug on
both sides of the Slim River road. Again, the ditches were dug with the
same small spades, just the right size for the generally small and short
Japanese soldiers. Advancing south with F Kikan, sometimes in a car,
sometimes on foot, and sometimes in boats, every step was painful as
my legs were still weak from my nerve debility. What could I do but
advance? The Japanese promise in Taiping that “Four Japanese soldiers
can carry you on a chair!” was mere lip service.
Since Ipoh, where some Japanese took umbrage at my open criticism
against the despicable behaviour of certain soldiers, I sensed shifty eyes
watching my every move. But I was determined to reach Kuala Lumpur.