"I've been shot!"

Close on the heels of my elephant hunt, this is another real live shooting incident that happened a long time ago.

My father used to be an arms dealer since the forties. He had two specially built strong rooms to house all the fire arms and ammunition. I used to go into his office and headed straight for the strong room, where my father would show me his new and old fire arms. There was quite a collection of old pistols, rifles and shotguns from all over the world including the Soviet bloc and the western countries. The new ones would come from England, Europe and the US, with manufacturers like Colts, Smith & Wesson, Webley, Baretta, Mauser and other names which I now cannot remember. I remember having a whale of a time playing with the various weapons. This was the time when I learned a lot about fire arms, and also learned how to shoot some of the weapons.

This was also during the insurgency, when the country was in a state of emergency fighting the communist terrorists. Besides supporting the police, tin mining companies and rubber estates had to beef up their security with armed guards. It was a rather lucrative period for my father.

During the weekends and certain evenings, we used to go in a group to shoot wild boar, flying foxes, snipes and wild pigeons. We brought them home where my mother would cook them.

On one particular evening sometime in 1954, we went to shoot wild pigeons along the main trunk road south of Ipoh and quite near to a small town named Temoh. The time was about five in the evening, and we were all standing along the road, looking up at the sky for the wild pigeons to return to roost after their feeding.

Standing next to me was K.S. Leong, an effluent tin miner and race horse owner, and friend of my father. He was not a hunter but a bystander like myself, for I was still a school boy at that time. Across the road and standing on a high ground, was Dr. Chin, a gynaecologist and one of the hunters, who happened to be a former classmate of K.S. Leong. Dr. Chin was carrying a loaded double barrel shot gun on his shoulder, and was looking at the sky, when he suddenly tripped into a hole on the ground. Throwing his hands forward, his right hand slammed the shot gun on the ground discharging a round. From where I was standing, I suddenly heard a loud bang and felt a blast of hot air passing me on the right. K.S. Leong suddenly clasped his hands to his face and shouting, "I've been shot!", stumbled and fell on the ground. All this happened so fast, I was momentarily stunned. When I looked at K.S. Leong, he was writhing on the ground with blood all over his face and chest. Dr. Chin ran across the road to tend to him amidst all the commotion. The hunters were using 12 gauge, No. 8 shot gun rounds, and this discharged a spray shot of very small lead pellets.

By this time, K.S. Leong was in distress and delirious with incoherent cries of pain. I could see the black pellets all over his face and chest. We carried him into the car and rushed him to the nearest hospital, which was quite a distance away in Tapah. All this time, Dr. Chin was monitoring his pulse and pacifying him as he was becoming more delirious. At the Tapah hospital, the A & E staff took over and tended to K.S. Leong. We left him there with the doctor, and he was subsequently transferred to Ipoh by ambulance, that night.

The next day, we all went to Tapah Police Station to record our statements to the police, who investigated the incident. They had to establish that it was an accident and not a malicious act.

K.S. Leong was hospitalised for a period of time. He lived through it and remained very cheerful not blaming anyone for the shooting accident. His face carried a lot of the pellets which could not be removed, and suffered much pain. It was very lucky that none of the pellets hit his heart. It was attributed to the fact that he had carried a stack of papers in his breast pocket. The wad of papers stopped the pellets from hitting his heart and indeed, some pellets were found inside his shirt pocket. In retrospect, I was lucky not to be hit since I was standing just next to him, though I felt the hot blast of the shot.

Both Dr. Chin and K.S. Leong are no longer with us today. Nevertheless, it was a frightening experience that I cannot forget. This is to be one of the many occasions, in which the Lord has been very kind to me, in saving my life.

Till then....