Between 1963 and 1970, I kept a daily diary with about 1 A4 page of mainly boring, repetitive information per day. The purpose of this page is to illustrate things I refer to elsewhere.

Tuesday, 1 September 1964	K.L –> Muar
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Bev in at 6.45 this morning, to find out why she had not been woken to go riding an hour before. In fact, Dad had delibeartely not set the alarm, but Bev did not find this out. However, she decided that there was still time, and got Rahmad to take her to the Turf club, and left us to try to get back to sleep.

I up with Dad for once, as a reult, and felt quite tired nevertheless. Decided to go into town with him as well, as I had a coule of things to do, but it was too early, and all I managed to do was to take BEv's camera to Eastern Photographers, and then back home again, feeling lousy. Mum suggested that I go back to sleep, and this advice I followed.

I was woken up by Bev with some bacon sandwiches, of all unusual things, for lunch, but I did not think much of them—nor, for that matter, did she—'twas Mum's idea, not hers.

As a result, I up again, and downstairs to look for something to eat, and returned with a couple of apples, which I proceeded to devour, reading a book on choice of films, etc.

This set me thinking about photography, and in particular about reversal, especially as it confirmed my suspicion that an ordinary film can be reversed. I tried permanganate, acidified with citric acid, but unfortunately the permanganate oxidised it, and so I tried dichromate, which, however, just tanned the image int brick-red Ag₂CrO₄, which was not very suitable. Tried permanganate with CH₃COOH, and it [sic] at any rate it did not react, but still no luck. O for some H₂SO₄.

Mrs O'Hara along to take Bev out to “A hard day's night”, and brought an interesting looking bird by the name of Jean with her.

Then off again, and I prepared my self more crumpets. I am sure the things are not intended to be frozen solid. Anyway, after 2 hours these things still had not thawed, and I finally gave up.

This was in the days before microwave ovens, of course.

After that, spent a lot of time doing little, and turned on the radio to hear the news, which was interesting—Indonesian paratroopers have arrived at Labis. 1 dead, 3 captured, and more being looked for. What fun, with us planning to go down there tomorrow.

This was part of Indonesia's Konfrontasi against the formation of Malaysia the year before.

Told Dad this when he got back, and it pleased him little. He thought wiht amusement about what Joe Dabrowsky [who lived in Labis] would be doing, especially if there is, as seems likely, a curfew tomorrow.

Left at a little after 6.00 pm, and rain was coming down in absolute torrents—the Indonesian fellows could not have had much of a night. Stopped at Malacca for makan, and then on, ever on, and got to the Muar rest house at about 10.15, and all were asleep, which meant that we had to wake them up—poor bastards. They must have to get up early.

It's funny that I didn't mention that, when we did wake them, they told us that the rest house was full. My father protested that he had made a booking, but they said no, there was only one outstanding guest, a Chinese called Ng Le Hey. My father's initials are NG.

Thursday, 3 September 1964	Muar –> K.L.
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Fellow came in with tea early this morning, which is unusual—in fact at 6.45, ¼ hour early. Up almost immediately, and out and down for a rather lousy rest house breakfast, with a tinned sausage, which looked like nothing on earth. While we were there, met Sun Sai Lun and a fat Malay friend of his whose name I have forgotten. Although they were in the Labis area yesterday, they did not know about the Indonesian landings, and we had to tell them.

In the 21st century it might seem racist to refer to the second person only by his race. But it certainly wasn't at the time, any more than referring people's height, girth or hair colour.

Then out to the Lenga land development scheme to have a look at progress, but the manager was not there, and after looking round and getting increasingly annoyed, we asked where he was, and it eventuated that the fellow Dad rang up yesterday had forgotten to tell him about it.

Then along to another place, Bukit Serampang, which, as the crow flies, is about 5 miles form Lenga, but it is across the Sungei Muar [river], and there is no bridge, so we had to go back to Muar, across the ferry, and back to the other side—a distance of about 70 miles. Went to sleep on the way, and woke up at the ferry, and bought some fruit, and had a drink on the other side. Then on, and had a flat not further up [sic], but, owning to experience, we did not take long to change it.

At Bukit Serampang, things were a lot better, except that the phone was not doing too well, and we could not get the manager. However, all went well nevertheless.

After that, to Segamat for lunch, and 'twas not bad, but then on to the police station, where they told us that the Teneng [unsure of the spelling] Station scheme was under curfew, but we went down there just to see what was going on, and discovered that it was not under curfew, and had a rather unpleasant drive in a Landrover, and nearly got killed at one point.

Then started the long drive back to K.L., and I off to sleep, and left Dad to the driving.

Then woke up, and we were at Tampin, where some football final was going on at the Rest House, but we had only stopped for tea, and on again fairly soon, as we wanted to get home in time for makan.

Finally arrived home at 7.20, and nobody even came down to open the door for us. T.V. addicts—that is what they are.

After makan, back to the Riepling family tree, and decided to write to all the likely mob to help bring it up to date.

The Riepling family is the family of my paternal grandmother. They came from Adenstedt, near Peine, between Hannover and Braunschweig. They showed a surprising propensity for having female children, and I believe the name has now died out. The family tree I had went approximately to 1930.

Friday, 4 September 1964	K.L.	Images for 4 September 1964
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Then back home, and prepared for the makan that we were having this evening—along to hte supermarket to get some liquor, and persuaded Dad to let me try a ½ gallon bottle of cider, which he reluctantly let me do. Then posted Jan's letter.

Back home, and a hell of a lot of fun was going on. Mum's car was parked in the drive, and she could not move it. Then she out to buy some food, and back to a fairly swinging party. Present was Julian Sandys, Duncan Sandy's son and Winston Churchill's grandson. Went to Eton, and learn much the same type of dirty songs there as we do at KCT, to judge by what he recorded of them. Cider completely finished by 1.30, when the party finished.

I should really be ashamed of the way I kept a diary in those days. This is only a small part of the day's entry, but I missed out a lot of things: first, Julian didn't show up just by himself, of course: we didn't know him, and I never saw him again. He was brought by Ananda Krishnan, and Lalita Rajasooria was also there. Both are in the photos, as is another person whom I no longer recognize

Julian sang at least one dirty song that I had never heard before, “Poor little Angeline”. My recollection of the words is that they weren't quite the same as the link, but it's obviously the same song, and Julian sang it well. I recorded it on tape, and I still have the tape, but it seems that I overwrote it only a year or two later.