Description
This book is based on the true life story of the author’s mother. The book’s protagonist, Sallamah, was born into a poor Chinese family where male babies were revered over female ones. As a result, she was given away to a Malay family during a time when inter-racial adoption was a common practice in Singapore. Sallamah grew up thinking that her life was ordinary. She lived in an ordinary kampong with an ordinary family and had an ordinary group of friends whom she played ordinary games with. Little would she realise that an innocent-looking piece of paper, her birth certificate, would reveal a secret which her parents had painstakingly kept from her, and it changed the reality of all that she thought she knew and understood.
The book takes the reader through Sallamah’s journey to help them understand the true meaning of family. Is “family” the one who gives birth to you? Or, are they the people who love and care for you?
