Mighty Bee

By Yong Soo Heong

NG BOON BEE was already a big name in the badminton world and synonymous with Tan Yee Khan when I was trying to make a mark in the sport in the late 1960s. Their successful partnership with relentless and powerful smashes was always imprinted in  my mind.

Somehow, I didn’t make it into ‘Big Time’ because of two primary reasons: my  journalism career got in my way (which is a good thing as I look back to those years)  and my belief that I could be a good player if I had perfected my strokes well enough.

Childhood friends Ng Boon Bee (right) and Tan Yee Khan in a buoyant mood
when they last met at Pangkor in mid 2022 – Tan Yee Khan pic reproduced
from FMT with permission

On this second point, how silly and mistaken I was. The game of badminton necessitates one to have match experience in order to excel as no one player is the same. I fault myself for not listening to my dad in this department. No point crying over spilt milk now, as they say.

Back to Boon Bee. One day at the tender age of 16-going-on-17 in 1971, I found myself in the company of the great man himself and his doubles partner, Punch Gunalan, in Ipoh. I was sent to compete in the Perak Open as the then President and Honorary Secretary of the Penang BA, the late Mr Gan Chin Huat and the late Mr Tan Lee Sin, had always wanted to give young players all the exposure to prove themselves.

Somehow, I lost in the early rounds to better opponents. I wasn’t tenacious enough or out of depth, to be frank. But my legs were already wobbly when I saw the two badminton luminaries listed down to play in the same tournament! I told myself how could I stand a chance when these two greats were around!

In between matches, I “bumped” into them at the Perak government chalet along Jalan Tambun where we were accommodated. I was with some of my senior team-mates from Penang who apparently knew Boon Bee and Punch better, when we saw the pair  resting in one of the rooms.

I too made a beeline to see what these two greats had to say as they had months earlier returned triumphantly with the coveted All-England men’s doubles title, beating Rudy Hartono and the late Indra Gunawan (who later went on to coach the Malaysian  team).

I peered from the door. Punch was munching on an apple while Boon Bee was relaxing on the bed. We made small talk. Can’t remember what we spoke as it was more my senior team-mates who did most of the talking while I was just a wallflower in the company of our country’s badminton kingpins. It was a scene I can never forget.

Back in those days when there was no “live” television to follow important badminton matches, Radio Malaysia was the only source of exciting sporting action. I would often  preen my ears to “live” radio commentaries and follow the blow-by-blow accounts on  Radio Malaysia.

Datuk Ng Boon Bee: Jumping into the air
was always an SOP – BAM Facebook pic

Radio Malaysia’s then sports presenter supremo, R. Jeyanathan, was often drumming  it into me with his trademark commentaries. I still remember his colorful description  which would sound like this: “Boon Bee leaps into the air and smashes, but it is well taken by Indonesia’s Indra Gunawan.

“Boon Bee springs into the air again and smashes but Hartono defends it well. Yee Khan smashes this time, and the shot is returned fast and furious.

“Wow! Boon Bee leaps up and chops the shot into the middle of the court. It catches  the Indonesians off-guard and yes!…Malaysia marches forward with another point.”

Boon Bee jumping into the air was always an SOP…standard operating procedure. That was his trademark as he possessed strong muscles in his thighs, which sometimes, to me, looked like that of a powerful frog.

That was why Boon Bee, an ex-pupil of St Michael’s Institution, Ipoh, could excel in  many sports because he could either outrun his opponents or be speedy about things.

He was even a prolific footballer representing Malaysia in the Merdeka Football tournaments in 1958 and again in 1959 when Malaysia were champions. This was the  premier tournament in Asia from the late 1950s to the late 1970s.

N. Thanabalan, an international footballer, recalls: “I had the privilege of playing  alongside Boon Bee for our employers, the National Electricity Board. He was a very  good teammate who was jovial and very highly motivated.”

Boon Bee was a very talented sportsman, who also excelled in athletics, rugby, and even tennis at state level.

But it was badminton that propelled him into the world stage and got him the most headlines and accolades.

During his prime in the mid-1960s till the early 1970s, he would travel in a quartet with his doubles partner Yee Khan, Yew Cheng Hoe and Tan Aik Huang as they took on the world.

Boon Bee and Yee Khan developed into a formidable pair, raking in title after title wherever they competed.

Yee Khan, who was devastated by the recent death of his doubles partner, said they had built up a formidable combination to be the best men’s doubles pair in the world  at one time because of their attitude towards the game.

They had one simple strategy or game plan: always analyzing their opponents game,  whether in defeat or victory.

“Whenever we won or lost, we would discuss how we could improve our game and tactics. We would always discuss before the game on what went wrong or what went right the day before. That was how we adapted well to each other by forging a good  understanding on what we should be doing and what we should not do when on the  court.”

On how he came to form a triumphant partnership with Boon Bee, Yee Khan says: “I was in Form 4 when I started playing together with Boon Bee. I was from Yuk Choy, a  Chinese school, but was subsequently enrolled at St Michael’s Institution where the then Brother Director Pius Kelly asked me to team up with Boon Bee. From there, it was the start of our successful partnership.”

Between 1960 and 1969, both Boon Bee and Yee Khan won some 20 prestigious titles together, including the All-England, US Open, Canadian Open, Denmark Open,  Singapore Open, Malaysian Open, Asian Championships, Asian Games and the  South-East Asia Peninsula Games.

The pair’s highest distinction was the Malaysian victory in the Thomas Cup in 1967,  gained in the teeth of a hostile crowd in Jakarta which was disruptive in behaviour  aimed at heading off a Malaysian triumph that Yee Khan’s and Boon Bee’s exploits in the doubles guaranteed.

The victorious Malaysian 1967 Thomas Cup team (from left) Yew Cheng Hoe, Tan Aik Huang,
Teh Kew San, BAM president Mohd Khir Johari, Ng Boon Bee, Tan Yee Khan and Billy Ng
– Tan Yee Khan pic reproduced from FMT with permission

Boon Bee, together with Yee Khan, starred with captain Teh Kew San, Tan Aik Huang, Yew Cheng Hoe and Billy Ng in the team that brought home the prestigious trophy in that series.

The Thomas Cup triumph was the capstone of a decade of distinction for the doubles pair.

Cheng Hoe recalls: “He earned my respect as our leader for he was a warm, caring and friendly person. It was always good to talk to him. He  would often ask about our well-being during our tours. With him around, it was like family.”

Sylvia Ng, Malaysia’s number one women’s shuttler at one time, also remembers Boon Bee as a friendly person. He proved to be an adaptable partner when he and Sylvia  teamed up to capture the 1970 Asian Games mixed-doubles title.

“We got on very well. Boon Bee was always easy to talk to,” she said. ”I shall definitely  miss him.”

Both Cheng Hoe and Sylvia agreed that it was Boon Bee’s physical adaptability to emerge as one of Malaysia’s greatest sportsmen as he subsequently found success with the late Gunalan after his regular partner Yee Khan retired from competitive badminton because of a serious head injury. This was after Yee Khan had a fall while jogging during training for the Rangoon (now Yangon) SEAP Games in 1969.

One of Boon Bee’s best performances was with Gunalan in the 1971 All-England final when they defeated Indonesia’s top pair of Rudy Hartono/Indra Gunawan. They also  won the Bangkok Asian Games and Commonwealth Games in Edinburgh, both in  1970.

“He was without a doubt not only a great player but the best doubles player during my time,” said Rudy Hartono, the seven-time All England singles champion in Jakarta.

“Rest in eternal peace my dear friend. Bless you.”

Fast forward to late 2019, I was in the company of ex-Uber Cupper Sylvia, former Thomas Cupper Saw Swee Leong and former Asian junior champion, the late Tan Aik  Mong. We were on a road trip to look for Boon Bee in Ipoh as Aik Mong said he had lost contact with him for quite a while.

We managed to track him down after going through several phone numbers. It was finally via Boon Bee’s wife, Tong Ee Cheng’s handphone! We met for coffee in a shopping mall. It was a great reunion among those big-time shuttlers and they reminisced about the good old times. Their camaraderieship was something to behold.

When Swee Leong volunteered to say that I was playing competitive badminton with him as well as the likes of James Selvaraj, Phua Ah Hua and Razif Sidek back in the 1970s, Boon Bee let out a bewildered response: “You must be joking!”

And that came from the man whom I held in awe. I can’t fault him for his sharp reaction or observation for I have ballooned into a 150kg sumo wrestler’s frame.

• This story, originally published in mysportsflame.com, is republished with the permission of the author. Read the original here. Read more about the writer here.

Losing a ‘new found’ friend in Aik Mong

Tan Aik Mong (left) with Yong at their last meeting.

By Yong Soo Heong

SHUTTLER Tan Aik Mong’s sudden demise in the evening of May 31, 2020 was indeed shocking, to say the least, for me.

One of my Penang badminton contemporaries, Lim Teong Khoon, had forewarned fellow members of our group chat to brace for something depressing as he disseminated the information. I sat stunned in my car after receiving the sad news.

Stunned and sad because it was just 10 days earlier that Aik Mong had shown how fighting fit he was by mowing the lawn of his Bukit Jelutong home. Later, he was seen strolling the greens at Kelab Golf Negara Subang for his second favourite game – golf – to the cheers of his many friends and club members.

Aik Mong was well-liked and had many friends as he was a good conversationalist although he may have had some unorthodox ideas on certain issues. He was open, opinionated but yet not offensive.

“Mahaguru” Tan Aik Mong (1950-2020): 
Open, opinionated but yet not offensive

But as they say, life is unpredictable. And I was devastated to learn that Aik Mong, 70, had finally succumbed to liver cancer which he fought for many years without the aid of chemotherapy on that fateful Sunday as I was beginning to get used to being a good friend to him.

I was comforted that he had Irene Ch’ng, his confidante of 22 years, by his bedside as he breathed his last breath. His son and family in Singapore were affected by the MCO restrictions then in place but they subsequently came in time for the funeral.

Irene had said that Aik Mong knew the end was near about three days before he was to go and did everything to set everything straight. In other words, he had fulfilled what he had set out to do and was able to let go of the material world towards the end. He was at peace with the world.

Earlier, Aik Mong in fact had planned to go to Johor just after Chinese New Year (CNY) with me and two other more accomplished shuttlers, Thomas Cupper Saw Swee Leong and six-time national champion Sylvia Ng. Besides wanting to sample the glorious food in Johor, he had wanted to meet two other badminton legends, Roland Ng and Billy Ng, elder brothers of Sylvia, and also a mutual friend, Albert Goh Teong Hoe, who had built a 19-court badminton complex in Johor Bahru. (Incidentally Roland died a few days later on June 10 at the age of 89). Ever since Aik Mong left his second Badminton Association of Malaysia (BAM) coaching stint abruptly in 2013, he had always wanted to find ways to contribute towards coaching the young. The Penangite, who was once BAM coaching chairman in the mid-80s, thought he had some interesting ideas to be put across to Teong Hoe in JB.

These thoughts actually germinated last November when the four of us – Aik Mong, Swee Leong, Sylvia and myself – had gone to Penang on a food extravaganza! But the MCO curtailed our movements this year and now Aik Mong, whom we affectionately called “Mahaguru” (Master) because of his deep and profound thoughts, is no more with us.

I had actually “known” (note the inverted commas) Aik Mong since the late 60s. “Known” is actually a safer word for I hadn’t got close to him due to our age gap although we passed each other almost every other day as we cycled to school in opposite directions – me to Westlands Secondary School and him to Methodist Boys School in Penang. He’d always nod his head in my direction. I reckoned he may have seen me practising at the Penang Chinese Girls High School Hall, then one of the nurseries of Penang’s many badminton players.

Source: mysportsflame.com

While I was a small fry, Aik Mong was already in the Big League then as he was a Thomas Cupper and played in the SEAP and Asian Games. He had already wrestled for individual honours with then Indonesian maestros like Muljadi (Ang Tjin Siang) and Iie Sumirat. His best achievements was winning the 1971 Asian championship in Jakarta when he beat then Japanese star, Junji Honma. Three years earlier, he had also beaten Honma for the Asian schoolboys’ title in Tokyo.

Aik Mong in training as a teenager:
Source: @aikmong on Twitter

In fact, Aik Mong played one of his best matches in the semi-finals of the Singapore Open in April 1969 when he beat Dhamardi (Wong Pek Shen) of Indonesia, who had just won that year’s All England men’s singles title about a month earlier, in a three-game thriller of 14-17, 15-14 and 18-14 lasting 69 minutes! Aik Mong, as a thinking player that he was, was observed to have changed tactics by placing many of his shots far to the baseline to thwart Dhamardi’s fast pace game.

Incidentally Aik Mong also partnered his elder brother, Aik Huang (best known for his 1966 All-England men’s singles triumph in 1966) to gun for honours in the men’s doubles event. As a pair, they had even beaten the top doubles combination comprising the late Punch Gunalan and Ng Boon Bee in the 1972 Singapore Open! In the same year, they had advanced to the final of the Indonesian Open but only to lose to the crack Indonesian pair of Ade Chandra and Christian Hadinata in another three-game thriller.

When Aik Mong was 24 years old and working as a computer analyst for Malaysia Airlines in 1975, he announced his retirement from competitive badminton. In citing his reasons, he said that demands were too great for him and that badminton at the national level was not a part-time thing or a pastime because the game was becoming more scientific and demanded a lot in terms of stamina or fitness, court-craft and strategic thinking.

“You have to do so much training and play to stay at the top. No, I don’t want to play badminton all my life. It’s not my whole life.

“I enjoyed playing badminton because it was good for me and good for my country. But when the demands are so great as they are today and the going is tough, it is no longer a joy to continue playing.

“But somehow I had the satisfaction of being among the respected players in international tournaments. I couldn’t ask for more,” said Aik Mong then.

During the course of my career as a journalist in the 1980s, I had actually stumbled into Aik Mong’s office at Kumpulan Guthrie in Damansara Heights for a news story totally unrelated to badminton. It was for a business story and I was referred to him as he was then the group’s top computer analyst and had been successful in laying the foundation to clinching many top-level computer-based government contracts for his employers.

After a long absence, I got “re-connected” with Aik Mong sometime in 2012 at the annual CNY dinners thrown by Teong Hoe at Restoran Oversea in Jalan Imbi, KL. And Aik Mong was always careful with what he ate because of his medical condition.

Somehow, I got along well with him as I was able to respond to what he had to say, no matter how bizarre or twistingly philosophical the topic may be. In 2015, we got closer as I was involved in the publicity part of a birthday bash for Teh Kew San, skipper of the victorious 1967 Thomas Cup team in Penang. We continued to stay in touch via WhatsApp and we would meet occasionally whenever he had an idea to discuss as I’d happily go along as I had nothing to lose by listening to his interesting insights.

But it was in 2019 when we got really closer as Aik Mong had planned to visit another badminton great, Ng Boon Bee, in Ipoh. Boon Bee was off the radar when he retired from a coaching position at the Royal Ipoh Club. At the same time, we were also going to see Swee Leong as he had bought a gated dwelling in Ipoh and was extolling the virtues of food served in the Perak state capital. For a Penangite to sing praises of Ipoh food, we thought we had to find out.

Aik Mong with Ng Boon Bee at Tesco Ipoh

While in Ipoh, Aik Mong tried connecting with Boon Bee from two telephone numbers that he had gotten from another badminton legend, Tan Yee Khan, in Pulau Pangkor, whom he had met about two months earlier. Aik Mong struck gold when the second number was answered by Boon Bee’s wife. And we got connected with Boon Bee at Tesco Ipoh.

An amusing incident happened at the shopping mall. As I momentarily left the group while the former national team-mates caught up with old-time reminisces, it seemed that Boon Bee had asked the trio — Aik Mong, Swee Leong and Sylvia — how on earth did they get associated with a burly guy like me whom he hadn’t known at all. (Like I said, being a small fry in a big pond, I did manage to speak to Boon Bee in Ipoh at the Perak Open in 1972 but how could he, as an already famous player then, remember me, either as a player, fan or human being?)

When told that I used to play competitive badminton with Swee Leong, Boon Bee said they must be joking as I was more suited for sumo wrestling!

They all didn’t tell me this until we were in the car on our way to KL. As Aik Mong related this conversation to me, he guffawed loudly in the trademark style of his father, Cheng Hoe, a noted football and badminton official in Penang in the 1950s and 1960s.

Aik Mong and I got along even better after that Ipoh trip. We would go for occasional lunches and at one instance, we even visited Lee Guan Chong, a noted badminton player and coach from Selangor, when he was hospitalised for a heart attack at PJ’s University Hospital in early November 2019.

Sylvia Ng, Saw Swee Leong and the writer on 
KTM’s Electric Train Service (ETS)

Aik Mong, Swee Leong, Sylvia and myself had some of our best times together when we went to Penang later that month. We had travelled on the speedy Electric Train Service (ETS) operated by KTM (Malayan Railway) to Butterworth from KL Sentral and later hopped on a pre-booked taxi that took us to all the popular eating joints in Malaysia’s island food paradise. Aik Mong had joked that I needed to buy two ETS seats in view of my girth. So, two seats were bought in my name but somehow Swee Leong could squeeze in the seat next to me as he came on board from Ipoh to Butterworth. (So I wasn’t that huge after all!)

Upon reaching Penang in the late afternoon, we soon “attacked” a coffee shop in Pulau Tikus known for its sizzling mamak mee goreng (Indian Moslem fried egg noodles) and mee rebus (egg noodles cooked in spicy gravy) in Bangkok Lane. In the evening, we “cornered” another coffee shop known for char koay teow (flattened rice noodles in fish sauce fried with bean sprouts, garlic and prawns), sotong kangkong (steamed cuttlefish & water spinach mixed with sweet chilly sauce), lor bak (Chinese meat rolls) and other local goodies.

Aik Mong, Saw Swee Leong and Sylvia Ng:
Outside Jin Hoe Cafe, Aik Mong’s secret
hideout for Chinese-styled nasi lemak

We were again in Pulau Tikus at sunrise for more good stuff – this time for heh mee or prawn noodles (egg and rice noodles, bean sprouts and water spinach cooked in spicy prawn & meat broth) and apong (fermented rice pancake cooked with coconut milk) at a popular coffee shop opposite the long-standing police station. Later Aik Mong took us to his secret hideout of a coffee shop at Jalan Cantonment (also in Pulau Tikus) only known to locals for its Chinese-styled nasi lemak (rice cooked in coconut milk and served with fried fish & pawns with a dollop of pounded red chillies mixed with prawn paste) as well as otak-otak (steamed spicy fish custard wrapped in banana leaves). They certainly brought back memories of yesteryears. Over the next two days, it was the same story – food, food, food.

But of significance was a dinner on Nov 18 where the thoughtfulness and diplomacy of Aik Mong shone through. He had wanted to throw a dinner party that included Kew San, affectionately known as “Ah Peh” (Old Man), among Penang’s close-knit badminton fraternity. Teong Khoon had picked Nov 18. Little did we know that it was also the date of his wedding anniversary.

Aik Mong ordered a cake for the occasion but soon sensed something wasn’t right as it turned out that Teong Khoon’s daughter from his first marriage had also wanted to attend the party. This definitely put Aik Mong in a tight spot.

Sylvia Ng, Aik Mong and Rosalind Singha Ang:
Three-in-one occasion – party for Teh Kew San, 
birthday for Rosalind and wedding anniversary
for Lim Teong Khoon

Amazingly he soon had a brainwave when he discovered that very day was also the birthday of Rosalind Singha Ang, another badminton great who coming all the way from Alor Setar, for the dinner. So, Rosalind got to blow the candles, then Aik Mong also announced that it was also Teong Khoon’s wedding anniversary and asked him to kiss his wife! A sticky situation was averted.

His wry sense of humour and a caring attitude will be sorely missed. Our “fireside chats” at the Jalan Macalister Airbnb late into the night about life in general and badminton specifically turned out to be some of the best times for our reflection. Aik Mong had also spoken of his rather short stint as a coach with BAM, how he had struggled to juggle between his studies and competitive badminton, and how he was living life then.

We did broach on the interesting subject on how the next Malaysian badminton great could be produced. Aik Mong’s views came in a roundabout way as he also spoke of Lee Chong Wei, Malaysia’s star player in the first two decades of the 21st century, and what he had done to achieve fame and glory. Aik Mong conceded that they came with a great price of sacrifice and sheer commitment that included long hours of toil at the gym and on-the-court training.

To put it simply, he was of the firm view that fitness is key to today’s fast-paced game. Without that, a player can’t go far because of the scoring system. We asked him how best one should attain that.

Aik Mong coolly said that if a player could skip 5,000 times a day as part of his or her training regime, then he or she would be on to something. The strokes and strategies can come later. Those words sounded like those of our Penang state schools badminton coach in the 1970s — Lawrence Barbosa!

His confidante Irene recalled that Aik Mong always took on a positive attitude all his life and emphasised that one should always look on the bright side and be happy. For instance, Aik Mong, being the doting grandfather that he was to his grandchildren in Singapore, they would always look forward to his visits because while he was there, there was no curtailment on wi-fi data or gadgets!

Aik Mong also used to say – “live life well and in the most humble way for only God is greater than us. We men are all equals.”

According to Irene, Aik Mong had confided in her that he was concerned for my well-being, especially my weight, as he felt that the demise of my wife, Amy, had affected me somewhat and hoped that I could move on. Such was the kind of concern of Aik Mong for the people he cared for.

I remember one amusing incident when I was sitting alone in a Penang cuisine restaurant in a Petaling Jaya shopping mall and was gorging myself silly over a bowl of spicy noodle soup: Aik Mong spotted me, came over to the open-style restaurant and bellowed from the aisle,”You shouldn’t be eating that!” And he laughingly cautioned me on my food intake.

I shall certainly miss Aik Mong’s sense of humour and his stimulating conversations, especially the cosy “fireside chats”. You were truly a Mahaguru, my friend. Rest well, my champ! 

• This story, originally published in mysportsflame.com, is republished with the permission of the author. Read the original here. Read more about the writer here. All photos, unless otherwise stated, are by the writer.