Father's Memorable Read

The book that my father most remembers is "The Jungle is Neutral". My father had read the book when he was in secondary 2. The book was a book prize he won for acing his History examinations.

This story is a re-count by F. Spencer Chapman as the commander of British Force 136, a motley band of anti-Japanese guerrilla fighters made up of British military, Communist as well as Kuo-Min-Tang (KMT, the Chinese Nationalist Party) elements.

As Chapman traveled by bicycle, motorcycle, dugout, on foot, or on his belly through the jungle muck, Chapman recruited sympathetic Chinese, Malays, Tamils, and Sakai tribesman into an irregular corps of jungle fighters.

Their mission was to harass the Japanese in any way possible. In some scenes, Chapman recalls their daring raids as they blew up bridges, cut communication lines, and affixed plastic explosives to troop-filled trucks idling by the road. They threw grenades and disappeared into the jungle, their faces darkened with carbon, their sub-machine guns wrapped in tape so as not to reflect the moonlight. When Chapman wasn't battling the Japanese or escaping from their prisons, he found himself fighting the jungle's harsh conditions.

My father finds in it significant relevance to the formation and political development of Malaya, and subsequently Malaysia and Singapore. He also finds Chapman's narrative to be a delightful read, full of amusing anecdotes that do not subtract from it's seriousness of the situation. He particularly enjoys the part about Spencer's cheating death when captured by the Japanese. Unbeknown to Chapman, the British High Command has elevated his rank from Captain to Major so the Japanese was offering a reward for the head of a certain Major Chapman. The Captain Chapman was then able to crawl out of the captive tent into the darkness of the dense Malayan jungle to continue his exploits.

I decided that since it was such an interesting book, I would want to read it too.