About Josephine Chia

I am a Peranakan (pronounced Pe-ra-na-kan) or Straits Chinese and am proud of my heritage. Peranakans are a minority group of Chinese people born in the Straits Settlements which comprised of Singapore, Malacca or Penang. We are rumoured to have been descended from an intermarriage of a Malay sultan from Malacca and a Chinese princess; or (more likely), from their servants, courtiers and the Chinese merchants who traded with the Malays of Malaya in the 15th Century and who married the local Malay girls. Traditionally, we dress like Malays in our sarong kebaya, speak a patois language of Malay and Chinese and we celebrate the Chinese New Year. Our cuisine is regarded as the cordon bleu of the region and is referred to as Nonya Food, nonya being a Peranakan female. (See my cookery book.) My first literate language is Malay although I speak Chinese as well (Teochew & Hokkien). All Peranakans love their food – and I am no exception and I eat at least three main meals a day, and more, sometimes to the despair of my English husband!

My mother, whom we called Mak, took in the neighbours’ washing so that I could go to school. My father thought education for girls was a waste of money. So in Mak’s honour, I like to be called Phine, her name for me. I was brought up in a kampong or Malay village in colonial Singapore under a leaky attap (palm-leaves) roof and no indoor bathroom. I fell in love with the English language when I was about eight and dreamt of becoming a writer of English books. I gave English tuition to the village children when I was 14. After being an Assistant Nurse (Dental) for seven years, I managed to get into university to read English and Philosophy. So when my collection of short stories, Isn’t Singapore Somewhere In China, Luv? (in English) was published by a Singapore publisher, Angsana Books, I was ecstatic!

I have two wonderful sons from my first marriage which sadly dissolved. Five years later, I married an Englishman and came to England in Autumn 1985. I trained to be a yoga teacher with the British Wheel Of Yoga and also read for an M.A in Creative Writing. I had a mention in the Surrey County magazine when my article on having my first experience of snow won a small competition. The highlight of that event was when my article was read out by an actor in the Great Hall at Farnham Castle!

My break into the UK publishing world came when I was one of the winners of the 1992 Ian St. James Award for short fiction. My story, Tropical Fever is in an anthology Blood, Sweat And Tears published by Harper Collins. My first public reading of my work was in Guildford library when my short story, Watercolour Dream won a prize in the Guildford Book Festival. Subsequently, my first novel was accepted by Landmark Books, another Singapore publisher. I self-published my cookery book, Rasa Singapura/Taste Of Singapore so that my mother would hold it in her hands before her mind succumbed to Alzheimer’s disease. My memoirs, Frog Under A Coconut Shell, is about her and her condition and my upbringing in the kampong. The book was published by Times Books International, Singapore and was launched in August 2002. Unfortunately my mother passed away two months after its publication. My yoga book, Body And Mind Sculpture is published by Parapress, a Kent publisher with a co-edition in Singapore brought out by Times Books International.