WEALTHY ORIENTALS

Greymouth Evening Star, 8 June 1937, Page 3

WEALTHY ORIENTALS

CONTRAST IN AIMS.

A dramatic contrast between the expenditures of two wealthy Chinese iesidents of Singapore is drawn here by the weekly English-language China Critic. Chinese-edited (says the Shanghai correspondent of the "Christian Science Monitor' ). The Critic lives up to its name in commenting upon a Straits Times, report tluit the well-known millionaire. Av. L'ooii Haw—who. to do him .insure, b-H-ld lx> identified as a fee(picni philanthropist—had "exhausted Singapore gold stocks" in gilding tin six domes of his new villa at Pasir i’anjang. The building is said to be probably the most costly one-story -10-foot-higb building in Singapore, and the domes are termed "one of the fin rsi examples of modern architectural design to be seen anywhere in Malaya and the Far East." But in Singapore also, the Critic

points out, there lives another nwu whose name is not much heard. His .contributions to China’s education arc not now as spectacular as they were a decade ago, yet "proportionately it may be truly said that it costs Tan ■ Ka Kee more to support the Amoy - University and the Chip Bee schools ’ now than in his heyday.” i "It is an indisputable fact,” coni' Unites the Critic, "that Mr Tan dci«liberatcly chose to see his company (go bankrupt rather than let the two {educational institutions founded and ■ (supported by him go unsupported. And' , it must be said that he does not seek ■ publicity, as the other philanthropist of iho same South Sea port does. "Instead of surrounding himself ; with great pomp and prosperity, he leads a simple life. He may not leave ■ to posterity a residence with: gold domes, the gilding of which exhausted Singapore’s gold stocks at one time, but those crude buildings of the Amoy I University and the Chip Bee Schools will remain a lasting monument to Mr Tan's contribution to China’s cduca- ; tional rebirth.”