I just came from there. Every two years, we have a reunion. It’s a boarding school, a mixed boarding school. So you have a girls’ boarding house and a boys’ boarding house. Boys started at 11, I was there at 11. And you go into a dormitory of 12 boys… Read More
Yeah. Okay, well, in Australia where I was in a primary school, then we went to Singapore. My brother was sent to a boarding school in England. I stayed in Singapore and did two years in a prep school, which prepared you for a British education. My mother was not… Read More
And as I say, we’re now 70s, early 70s. And through Facebook 20 years ago, we got together. And we’ve really been meeting. As I say, literally every two years we go there. The actual school is shut down, but we stay in hotels and we celebrate. And we celebrate… Read More
You could say consciousness, yeah. It certainly honed a great interest for wildlife. In my brother, it honed an interest for botany. My brother studied botany at Oxford, and we always had this difference in our interests. I mean, he was not particularly interested in animals, but he really liked… Read More
We went to boarding school in England. When we finished school, we both opted to go into biological sciences. So you mentioned school. Read More
Could you tell me a little about your formal education as you moved up you were in boarding school?… Read More
He would go into the forest, cut down saplings, make a kitchen off the ground where you could all sit down and cook and not have to be on the ground because it would be wet, rainy, and make some other basic facilities. And then the students would come in… Read More
So in these trips, did your father then help you shape your consciousness about nature and wildlife?… Read More
And some of those students I know today, they’re probably maybe 10 years my senior, zoologists in Singapore. Read More
And did these trips help shape your feelings about nature?… Read More
Yeah, so as a professor of zoology in Singapore and Malaysia, although they had split as two separate countries, there were very great connections between the two universities, University of Singapore, University of Malaysia. And so we used to go up every year with his students to a place called… Read More
Were animals and nature part of your life?… Read More
And I think that was probably a very important lesson for me about respect, respect for animals. The fact that doesn’t really matter what animals they are, you have to treat them with respect. That was powerful for me. So you took trips in the jungle with your father. Read More
Yeah, absolutely. I mean, so my father being a zoologist, basically, used to bring back a lot of wild animals, which were given to him as a zoologist, sort of roadkills, fruit bats getting electrocuted on high pipe cables or so the young, so I had fruit bats, owls, in… Read More
Bernard Ming-Deh Harrison, born in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia on the 31st of December, 1951. Tell us a little about your parents and what they did. My mother was a nurse, she was Chinese, a nurse during the Second World War. She was born in Fuzhou, China, and then her parents… Read More
My father then went on to do his DSC, Doctor of Science from Imperial College, and worked in the Institute for Medical Research in Malaysia, and then went to Queensland Institute for Medical Research where he worked on scrub typhus, leptospirosis, and was working on the mites. So he was… Read More
Your legacy?… Read More
Legacy. Just read what I write. (laughing) Then you’ll find out. You be the judge, not the author. No. Thank you, Ken. Anytime. Read More
But, so. I’m very pleased with how it turned out. Happy person in that aspect. Read More
It’s a worthwhile field. I’ve been very fortunate that, maybe I’m repeating myself, but I’ve been very fortunate, but childhood dream came true, with up and down, twists and turns, difficulties. I lived decades in the zoo field, and in the process, I met with such great people, such as… Read More