Sometimes Shaken, Sometimes Stirred

    Early this year, I was at a book launch in Ooty by an alumnus of Breeks School. The book, The Swaraj Spy, written by Vijay Balan was about events long forgotten. The book made me think about men who had lived in Singapore in 1941 when the Japanese bombarded the island city. The first one who came to mind was Jacob Mathew Wattacheril, who in his short autobiography called Waves of Memory talks about Japanese-occupied Singapore. He arrived in Singapore from Kerala, India, a 21-year-old filled with the hope of making a life for himself. After a few setbacks, he fulfilled his life’s ambition and joined the police force. He recalls that on the night of December 7 1941, he and his batch mates were preparing for their law exams,  the Commandant came to their room and to tell them that the exams are cancelled as there was a possibility of a Japanese attack. Jacob Mathew and his colleagues went to bed and were  woken up almost immediately. In the early hours of December 8, the Commandant