Our former tent now contained three people: Bill Butcher, Henry Baird and myself. Bill moved out and joined his friend the doctor, and Henry and I had the tent to ourselves. It appeared that life in Changi had its blessings. The University was going full swing in the three month terms, and there were weekly Variety shows and occasionally classical concerts. The disadvantages were shocking food, and the fact that the ‘Free Indian’ sentries were being very bloodyminded to all ranks passing them en route to the hospital, or to the area of any other division or brigade. The food really was chronic. The first evening meal was the best they had had for ages and consisted of a pile of steamed rice, a baked sweet potato, and a rice flour meat roll approximately 98 per cent soggy rice; the pudding was ground rice flavoured with citronella, or lemon grass.

The routine was reasonable. Between our rice breakfast and our lunch rice, all the daily duties and fatigues started and sometimes ended, though two hours’ work in the afternoon was demanded. There was P.T. precisely at Reveille, while a great mountainous Gutty toddled round blowing a whistle. The morning fatigues consisted mainly of gardening, keeping down the lalang grass, cleaning malarial drains and digging ditches. Three times a week we had an early morning Drill Parade. The afternoon, a time of inertia and sweltering heat, was University time, and we had to wear shirts (a) to show that we were British officers, by gad! and (b) to ensure that we sweated and wore out our shirts and got prickly heat as often as possible. There was one Brigadier, on the other hand, the first man to realise the sense of toughening our skins to the sun, who forbade all ranks under him in his working camp to wear shirts at all.

Our acting Brigadier was a certain Lt Col Joyce, generally known as ‘Nuts’. He was an eccentric fellow and quite unpredictable. On one occasion, in his Mess, he had lost his temper with the Padre and threw his spoon at him. Luckily, he was controlled by two successive quiet and efficient adjutants.

During the last couple of months the gardens had greatly improved. For instance, the battalion gardens consisted now of an acre and a quarter of ground laid out in long, shallow beds of kangkong, a sort of small spinach, and sweet potatoes. The soil was so sour and poor that tubers of the potatoes would just not form, so we ate the potato tops as greens. Most unpalatable! Cucumbers and tomatoes, if they grew at all, had a habit of disappearing by night just before they were ripe, and were therefore discontinued as crops. We also tried Ceylon Spinach, Chinese Radish with some success, and shallots, but no European vegetables would take at all.