Friday August 10, 2012
WHY NOT
By D. RAJ
The Star
As the Olympics wind to an end, it’s time for some nostalgia, and to remember the first Malaysian woman to take part in the Olympics and those Olympians who never made it there.
THE condo unit is a dedication to sports. On the shelf, there is a photo of the legendary Jesse Owens with a young girl, there are medals hanging on the wall and trophies on the cabinet. The coffee table is inlaid with sports pages.
“That’s me in the march past,” says the sprightly lady of the house, pointing to the table. Her name is Annie Choong.
Never heard of her? Well, long before shooter Suriyani Mohd Taibi had the whole world excited by going to the Olympics while being heavily pregnant, there was Choong. You could call her Malaysia’s first lady of the Olympics.
She was, after all, the first Malaysian woman to take part in the Games.
Choong was the only female member of the 30-something contingent to the 1956 Melbourne Games.
Meeting a legend: Choong with Owens when he came to Malaysia.
And she was one competitive girl. She ran the 100 yards, 200 yards and did the long jump as well!
Choong is still around. Now in her 70s, the lady, still slim, sprightly, active and looking much younger than her age, talks fondly of those days.
“There were seven of us in the athletics team then,” she recalls. “And we didn’t have the kind of dedicated training and coaching that athletes these days get.”
She said she would get up in the morning, go to work and then cycle from Kampung Baru to Cheras where the training was done. And exhausted after the training, she would cycle back home, only to get up and go to work again the following day.
“I had two coaches, Lim Thye Hee for the sprints and Lee Fun for the long jump. Both had been to the Olympics.”
And it wasn’t just the Olympics. She took part in the 1954 Asian Games in Manila and the 1958 Asiad in Tokyo, also qualifying on merit for the Games.
She retired from athletics in 1960 but the need for speed stayed.
Choong then switched to motor-racing. All togged up in leather suit and helmet, she took part in the Kenny Hill climb on a 50cc bike and won the race, beating five rivals – all males! Now, that’s competitive spirit for you.
But there’s a tinge of regret. She donated many of her trophies and the blazer she wore in the Melbourne Games to the National Museum. They were on display for a while but have been mothballed now.
“I wish I could have them back,” she says.
There are many others with regrets, too. Those would be the Olympians who never got to be there.
The first Malaysian to have qualified for the Olympics was a certain Eu Eng Hock, later to become Datuk Eddie Eu. It was 1932 – the times of the Federated and Unfederated Malay states.
Eu must have been something special. He was the 120-yard hurdles champion of this country and China came calling, asking him to represent that nation in the Los Angeles Olympics.
“It would have been very costly and involved travelling by ship for weeks to the United States,” says his son Leslie Eu.
So, the clerk with Boustead did not go. And our nation lost a chance of having its first Olympian then.
Little is known of the senior Eu now. World War II came soon after and a bomb flattened their home in Port Swettenham, now Port Klang. All his medals and memories of his achievements were gone.
The whole family, including a seven-year-old Leslie walked (yes, walked) along the rail tracks from Klang to Kuala Lumpur to move in with relatives.
After the war, Eu returned to the tracks (the racing one) and remained Malaysian champion until 1948.
The Olympics is every athlete’s dream. It must have been hard to miss out on the Games.
Many more missed out, too, when Malaysia decided to boycott the Olympic Games in Moscow in 1980.
Among them was Datuk Ow Soon Kooi, who was to have captained the national hockey team.
“It was one of the most frustrating things in my life,” he said in a recent interview. “We had worked so hard to get into the Olympics. And then, we were not going.”
The national football team also qualified for the Moscow Games and they, too, had to miss out.
Abdullah Ali was among those who would have played in Moscow. “Of course, we were frustrated not to be at the Olympic Games, then. We had to abide by the decision of the Government to boycott the Games. The FAM did compensate the team by sending us on a month-long tour of Europe – London, United States, Germany and Brazil,” he said.
“But nothing beats the chance of a lifetime to compete with the world best teams at the Olympics. The South Koreans (whom Malaysia defeated in the qualifiers) got to play instead.”
For Datuk Santokh Singh, it’s an agony every four years. “We can only watch it on television now,” he said. “Yes, we qualified on merit and to miss the biggest stage is indeed a bitter blow. And we cannot call ourselves Olympians. It is sad that we should mix politics and sports.”
Sad, indeed.
> The writer believes that the country needs a sports museum where all athletes who have made us proud can be honoured. A Hall of Fame alone is not good enough.
http://www.sports-reference.com/olympics/athletes/ch/annie-choong-1.html
WHY NOT
By D. RAJ
The Star
As the Olympics wind to an end, it’s time for some nostalgia, and to remember the first Malaysian woman to take part in the Olympics and those Olympians who never made it there.
THE condo unit is a dedication to sports. On the shelf, there is a photo of the legendary Jesse Owens with a young girl, there are medals hanging on the wall and trophies on the cabinet. The coffee table is inlaid with sports pages.
“That’s me in the march past,” says the sprightly lady of the house, pointing to the table. Her name is Annie Choong.
 |
| Meeting a legend: Choong with Owens when he came to Malaysia. |
She was, after all, the first Malaysian woman to take part in the Games.
Choong was the only female member of the 30-something contingent to the 1956 Melbourne Games.
Meeting a legend: Choong with Owens when he came to Malaysia.
And she was one competitive girl. She ran the 100 yards, 200 yards and did the long jump as well!
Choong is still around. Now in her 70s, the lady, still slim, sprightly, active and looking much younger than her age, talks fondly of those days.
“There were seven of us in the athletics team then,” she recalls. “And we didn’t have the kind of dedicated training and coaching that athletes these days get.”
She said she would get up in the morning, go to work and then cycle from Kampung Baru to Cheras where the training was done. And exhausted after the training, she would cycle back home, only to get up and go to work again the following day.
“I had two coaches, Lim Thye Hee for the sprints and Lee Fun for the long jump. Both had been to the Olympics.”
And it wasn’t just the Olympics. She took part in the 1954 Asian Games in Manila and the 1958 Asiad in Tokyo, also qualifying on merit for the Games.
She retired from athletics in 1960 but the need for speed stayed.
Choong then switched to motor-racing. All togged up in leather suit and helmet, she took part in the Kenny Hill climb on a 50cc bike and won the race, beating five rivals – all males! Now, that’s competitive spirit for you.
But there’s a tinge of regret. She donated many of her trophies and the blazer she wore in the Melbourne Games to the National Museum. They were on display for a while but have been mothballed now.
“I wish I could have them back,” she says.
There are many others with regrets, too. Those would be the Olympians who never got to be there.
The first Malaysian to have qualified for the Olympics was a certain Eu Eng Hock, later to become Datuk Eddie Eu. It was 1932 – the times of the Federated and Unfederated Malay states.
Eu must have been something special. He was the 120-yard hurdles champion of this country and China came calling, asking him to represent that nation in the Los Angeles Olympics.
“It would have been very costly and involved travelling by ship for weeks to the United States,” says his son Leslie Eu.
So, the clerk with Boustead did not go. And our nation lost a chance of having its first Olympian then.
Little is known of the senior Eu now. World War II came soon after and a bomb flattened their home in Port Swettenham, now Port Klang. All his medals and memories of his achievements were gone.
The whole family, including a seven-year-old Leslie walked (yes, walked) along the rail tracks from Klang to Kuala Lumpur to move in with relatives.
After the war, Eu returned to the tracks (the racing one) and remained Malaysian champion until 1948.
The Olympics is every athlete’s dream. It must have been hard to miss out on the Games.
Many more missed out, too, when Malaysia decided to boycott the Olympic Games in Moscow in 1980.
Among them was Datuk Ow Soon Kooi, who was to have captained the national hockey team.
“It was one of the most frustrating things in my life,” he said in a recent interview. “We had worked so hard to get into the Olympics. And then, we were not going.”
The national football team also qualified for the Moscow Games and they, too, had to miss out.
Abdullah Ali was among those who would have played in Moscow. “Of course, we were frustrated not to be at the Olympic Games, then. We had to abide by the decision of the Government to boycott the Games. The FAM did compensate the team by sending us on a month-long tour of Europe – London, United States, Germany and Brazil,” he said.
“But nothing beats the chance of a lifetime to compete with the world best teams at the Olympics. The South Koreans (whom Malaysia defeated in the qualifiers) got to play instead.”
For Datuk Santokh Singh, it’s an agony every four years. “We can only watch it on television now,” he said. “Yes, we qualified on merit and to miss the biggest stage is indeed a bitter blow. And we cannot call ourselves Olympians. It is sad that we should mix politics and sports.”
Sad, indeed.
> The writer believes that the country needs a sports museum where all athletes who have made us proud can be honoured. A Hall of Fame alone is not good enough.
http://www.sports-reference.com/olympics/athletes/ch/annie-choong-1.html
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