How was five-year-old Angeline to know that soon, very soon, she would be hurled with unimaginable force straight into the searing flames of a cruel, burning war, called the Second World War? After all, she had lived in La Dolce Vita that was pre-war Singapore—the most extravagantly carefree city after Paris—all her young life.

Life was heaven. Of course her mother threatened to pack her off to school whenever she was found playing with her friends (the fisher folk's kids), but she also got to eat the yummiest hawker-style food every day. Her doting mama even dressed her up, like a walking-talking doll, in such pretty, velvet-and-lace pinafores and matching shoes!

It was the year 1939 and there were ugly war-clouds scudding over the horizon. One could, if one cared to look, detect the faintest shadow of secretive impatience on the smooth visage of the Japanese trader who was otherwise of impeccable manners—bowing to you most politely as he saw you out of the shop...