Victor Chin

Heah Hock Heng passed away on 20 October, 10 days short of his 64 birthday. I first met Heah, in the 80’s, when I just joined the Malaysian Nature Society (MNS). He needed volunteers to help do a painting job at the MNS field centre in Cameron Highlands.

Apart from working as a painter I also ended up cutting chillies and onions etc. in the kitchen. Heah was both the project manager as well as the chef at that time. He was already renown then for his work in the field .

My painting was not up to standard and neither was my cutting skills. But that was the beginning of my long friendship with Heah and later with his wife Cheong Ann and some friends from the MNS days.

Heah (standing in the far right) making sure that the lunch for the party was in order, 2007, at KLPac.

Two years ago, I asked Heah and his friends to help cook a lunch for 100 persons. This was a party for a mixed disability group of friends at the KLPac. It was to celebrate the exhibition of photographs of the disabled athletes, which I had done.

Heah was one person who was always willing to help, when he can, no matter what it may be. He also had a distinguished career as a project manager for forest and environment related projects in Malaysia.

Heah with all his friends helping out at the KLPac lunch for the disabled friends, 2007.

But most of all, Heah will be remembered as a chef, for feeding thousands of MUS members ‘5 start hotel food’ deep in the Malaysian mountains.

Heah’s funeral will be on Saturday 24 October, 2pm, Trinity Methodist Church, Petaling Jaya.

MARCH 1 – This black-and-white photograph of an artificial right leg without the body is an unusual and intriguing sight.

How many of us have come across this uncommon situation in the mainstream of our normal daily life? Normally, it is usual to meet a person without one or both of their legs but never a leg without the other limb and the rest of the body. Whose leg is this and where is the body? What is it doing there? This is surreal.

Where did this incongruous image come from? This bizarre portrait of a single prosthetic right leg with its shoe on and in a pair of blue jeans, set in a men’s changing room, is now on show at the photographic exhibition “Empathy”.

This is the third collection of my photographs focusing on people with various disabilities going about doing sports and other activities and enjoying their life.

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The ability to understand someone else’s feelings as if they were one’s own is not something we do easily and often. It is demanding and thankless. Perhaps that may explain why most of us are mainly concerned with the needs our own self and those of our immediate family. How others feel is hardly our interest. How about considering some empathy?

My exhibition of photos Empathy at KLPac closed on the 8 March. This third collection of images of people with disability doing their own thing in sports and in work, was on display for 7 weeks. During that time there were several write ups about the exhibition and one of the portraits of Siti Aishah made it to the front page of the Sunday People in the NST’s Sunday Times.

This media coverage of the disabled group gave all those people in this small and fragile community a much needed visual profile which they seldom get. The Star newspaper’s writer Tan Karr Wei also wrote about the portraitures with understanding.

Then there was Elaine Lau from the Option of the Edge who also gave a voice to this often voiceless fellow citizens. Ng Suzhen from the Malay Mail was the first to put this story in her CyberSpot page. The Chinese press too especially the writer Chee Nyuk Yan from Nanyang Siang Pau gave this group a center spread in their Sunday edition and this was followed by Sin Chew Daily’s reporter Ten Yien Hsia’s news of the event. I was also invited to talk about the exhibition on TV3’s Malaysia Hari Ini morning magazine show.

After all the effort of first going out to get the cooperation of all my disabled friends to allow me to photograph them, and then to mount and promote the visibility of the subject to a larger public, it had dawn on me that this project of promoting a little more empathy for others, has been all a group effort by everyone who has been involved. This is also a note of thanks to all of you. Now I am beginning to understand.

Yaakob Saad and his family come to our party, though he and his wife are blind, their four children are born normal and healthy like the rest of us. Their children are now their parents’ eyes.

Godfrey and Yaakob, two blind old musical friends meeting at the party after many years

Carol telling us a little about herself and how much she likes to live an independent life.

Thanks to H L Lee for sharing his photos of last Saturday’s party at KLPac. There were many new friends to the gathering this year and among them a few old friends were meeting again after many years.

Peter Tan was happy with the portrait I did of him at the Sentral Train Terminal in Kuala Lumpur. On that day that I took his picture he and some of his friends were there testing out the various facilities to measure their disable friendliness for persons like him.

Part of the group of people at the Saturday party, doing their own thing, having lunch or talking with some friends etc.

On the right, Wairah was showing some of the artworks done by her daughter Nurul. Next, Jenny Tan was also  showing works of her son Seng Kit to all those at the party.

My friends, from the left, Charlie, Chong and Carmen, who drought the mandarin oranges, all came to give us some help with the party.

To arrange a social gathering like this  I needed a lot of help from my friends and many of them came to help and to join in the fun and the friendship.