My friend , Liu Pong Chou

Jai Yee

I am still in shock to hear that Liu Pong Chou passed away so suddenly. I read Alex’s e mail repeatedly trying to deny the truth.

Pong Chou was one of my best friends in Pui Ching. We commuted together from HK to Kowloon for many years while attending Pui Ching and spent a lot of fun hours in the ferry, along with Kwan Chi Kwong and Lee Tse Hang. He went to Australia and I went to Taiwan in 1959.

One day in 1966, a couple of weeks after I moved to Toronto, I was walking in the old China Town’s residential area. Suddenly I heard a familiar voice talking with someone across that narrow street. As I looked up, there he was, my friend Liu Pong Chou. As I saw him, I ran across the street. We both were in such a shocking happiness that we couldn’t talk for a few moments. We were like two grown kids yielding and kicking on the street. Then I walked him to his place, and met his roommate, our math teacher Mr. Do’s brother.

Both Do and I were busy looking for jobs while Pong Chou enjoyed attending school. Toronto had very few Chinese at that time, and we felt very lucky to have some old friends in the same neighborhood. The three of us enjoyed many, many “pure talk “ hours. He especially liked to talk about his experience in Australia. Soon I left Toronto and haven’t heard from him for a long time.

The last time I saw him was at the Gala party at the reunion. We had a long and pleasant conversation . Later, I asked him where his wife was, he said she was very sick and needed to be taken care of most of the time. I encouraged him to take care of himself and needed to come out more often.

I just talked with Lee Tse Hang, we both miss him a lot.