Robert Yan

At ZhangJiaJieh National Park, Hunan Province, China. 11/08

I left Hong Kong in 1960 and attended the Univ of California at Berkeley.

Following my parents emigration to Canada, I went to the Univ of Toronto & became a pharmacist which is what I have been doing for 38 years.

My wife Amelia is a microbiologist who has worked in the food and drug industries.

We live in a nice house by the lake which had been converted from an old cottage, doing quite a lot of the work myself over a period of time.

I enjoy reading good books, both Chinese & English, on literatures and history. We both like good movies, and good food.

I especially like fishing and boating . We used to go camping a lot.

Robert

Robert Yan found this entry in his old 1954 diary, about a schoolyard incident, which triggered a slew of memories from the participants and which proves that we SJC boys were tough!

Anthony wrote:

I know Bobby Lo very well.

After St. Joseph's College he went to the US for higher education after Form 4. After I came back to Hong Kong I met his brother Tin who represent the Bank of Nova Scotia ( gone now ) and learned that Bobby had a car accident in highway and passed away during his university years. (Note: Tin Lo, Bobby's brother, had worked in H K in between 1970s to 1980s. He then worked on his own financial company back in Vancouver in the 90s.)

Going back to the " famous " fights at the St. Joseph's courtyard. Bobby pushed Lo-Joe around and was followed by a short scuffle between them. Lo- Joe was almost backed up against of the chestnut trees. The situation looked bad and there was a small crowd of lower form students gathered slowly around. I yelled at Bobby for not picking someone of his own size. Not getting the better side of Lo-Joe, he came rushing to me and start jabbing one of his arm at me. Instinctively I moved his arm away and jumped forward shouldering his body back. The move startled Bobby and surprised myself too as I was usually a quiet and gentle person. Bobby, obviously wanted to finish me quickly as the crowd was getting bigger and fearing Brother Branden might be aroused, swung his left foot towards my right loin. I swiftly ducked, bending my left knee and swung my right leg around hittng his grounded right leg. Bobby fell flat in his face and absolutely couldn't believe what had happened. The reflexes action stunned myself as much as Bobby as I had been acting completely by instinct all along. Robert should remember this incident very clearly as he, Lo-Joe and myself were together during that recess. The bell rang and quickly we walked back to class leaving Bobby sitting on the ground still stunned.

After class that day I met Bobby on the No. 4 bus going from Central to North Point. " I hope I didn't hurt you", he said. " Not a bit " I replied. We both smiled and shook hands.

That is one of my fond memories of our school days.

Anthony.

Lo Joe wrote:

I envy your superb memory. Now that you have revealed the incident, I have recollected the BIG FIGHT but still with many missing pieces. I thought I beat him to the ground. The furious him then ran after me and you and Fong came to the rescue. Something like that. Am I right ?

Anthony wrote:

I am glad your mort comes back to you.
Yes you are right that Bobby came after you calling you names in the hope of having a good fight with you.
Fong and I ran after you and Bobby.
You must have said something not very complimentary to him.
Anyway it was quite something involving the 3 of us.
Could you think of some more incidences that were out of the ordinary in our good old days?

Robert wrote:

It was at a separate occasion, either before or after he fought Joe and Anthony.
After the pushing and yelling, I had him in a head-lock with my right arm around his neck from behind.
He struggled to get loose. Somehow one of my right fingers slipped into his mouth and he bit on it hard .
I punched him with my left hand and he let go. His tooth mark remained on my finger for a long time afterwards.

In the 50's our extracurricular activities were mostly footballs, basketballs and swimming. We also occasionally would go picnicking to 'far away places' like Sha Tin, or climb a 'mountain' around our neighborhood. I and a group of friends liked fishing a lot. It has been one of my favorite hobbies ever since.
An entry on my old diary about a fishing trip just on the beach in North Point :

Here in 1953, the whole Form 1B class went on a trip to NamSangWai. The farm belonged to the family of Wu Ji Sum .

Note the horse Wu Ji Sum was showing us. (his face partially hidden by Joseph Chan)

In the 3rd pix, there was our form master. What was his name ? ( I honestly cannot recall ). To his right is Wu Ji Sum. Below at his waist level is Moses.

Anthony Cheng wrote:

Good show Bernard!
Mr. Lau used to co-own a pharmacy almost below Robert's family flat on King's Road in North Point. He was nicknamed Ah Shou. Do correct me if I am wrong. Robert should remember the Pharmacy.

Fat Fellow Cheung kept waving at us his latest isssue of Reader's Digest saying how good its English was. I didn't really got along well with this fat fellow as I had been caught a couple if times "cross-table" talking.

Those are definitely the good old days.

Bernard Leung wrote:

I'm afraid the nickname was 'Ah Fook'. Ah Shou was the form-master of Form 2C, a soft-spoken young guy just returned to HK from the US, Lo Joe must rememeber him.

Robert Yan wrote:

That's right, Ah Fook. Thank you Bernard. But I'm still confused about the year. F1, F2, F3, each mastered respectively by , FayLo Cheung, Ah Fook, Ah Luk ? Ah Luk was definitely F3.

That drug store Anthony mentioned was across the street from my home on King's Road. Ah Shou was 'on duty' not everyday though. My memory of him is very vague; he was not a young man.

Who else among us has these pictures ?

Again Robert:

After re-examining all the material at hand, Ah Leung you are absolutely right. The year was 1954... Form 2B, but the teacher was Ah Fook as you've later corrected.

In December 2006, on my trip to the US west coast (Seattle, San Francisco, & LA) I managed to track down Reginald Mak in Seattle. We hadn't seen each other for almost 40 years. We sat at a Starbuck sipping coffee and reminisced about the good old days at SJC and UC Berkeley. We both laughed out loud when we recounted a camping trip we took in HK shortly before we embarked on our journey west to attend university; I in 1960 and he a year later.

In my diary of 1959, an entry dated Dec 5th :

I got my driver's license in the summer of 1958. My dad had an Austin Minor then and I immediately became the chauffeur of the house.

I, along with many of my classmates, had already decided to go abroad for university. While waiting for the papers, back & forth applications, etc, I went back to SJC as a matter of course to attend Form 6, lower 6. Many of us did not apply ourselves however, wholeheartedly in studying, knowing full well we were to leave soon.

One fine spring morning in 1959, March 6th. We left the morning class during recess. Five of us; Anthony Cheng, Moses Wong, Sylvester Hung, So Kwok Cheung and I, piled into the little Austin Minor and headed to cross the harbour and drove to the New Territories.

My diary entry for that trip: