Section 40: Kampung Mahsan

Breath through flames of war Mahsan ever stronger The Legend of Mahsan New Village

According to some senior residents in Mahsan New Village, the village was found during Japanese Occupation. It was named as “Pujiko” then. Around 1930, before the Occupation, Mahsan was a wasteland, there were only a few houses with zinc roofs. The residents used to plant various vegetables around their houses.

During World War II, Japan invaded Asia and Malaya. Mahsan was occupied by Japanese army and people there were in dire straits. At that time, Mahsan was designated as one of the concentration camps. Many war prisoners from other concentration camps were sent there to construct roads and farms.

These Japanese soldiers named Mahsan as “Pujiko”, meaning hometown of the prisoners, as they were expected not to go back to their home countries and would live there forever.

The residents recalled that some strategic resources of Japanese army were excavated in Mahsan. They found about eighty-three barrels of forty-five-gallon diesel oil and one barrel of coconut oil.

Those days, children in Mahsan were innocently wandering in the British army and the communist battlefield. Mahsan is indeed a legendary New Village.

In Mandarin, the characters of ‘Mah’ and ‘San’ means horse’s body while ‘Ba’and ‘hau’ is the horse’s mouth. According to Wikipedia, Mahsan exists because of Bahau. Indeed, when Bahau was taken as ‘horse’s mouth’, residents then thought that the horse ought to live in the jungle nearby. When the jungle was open up, they spontaneously named the place as ‘Mahsan’ which means the ‘horse’s hill’. As time passes, the horse’s hill became horse’s body because the pronunciation of ‘hill’ and ‘body’ in Mandarin are the same.

Some local senior residents recollected after the Japanese army left, many communists appeared in the jungles nearby. The communists and the British army opened fire at each other behind the new village. As kids, they were not frightened but wondered around the area. Even though they were near to the battlefield, the British army had no intention to avoid civilian from getting too nearby.

Today, the only historical relic left is a building which was the formal Mahsan police station. It was built by the British army as detention center.

Mahsan was built to encircle the communists. In the state of emergency, like all other new villages, residents lived on a big pot of rice. Every family would send a representative to the common kitchen

to collect their daily food. Amount of food allocated for each family depended on the size of their family. The cost and expenses were deducted from their monthly salary.

After years of reforms, the communists finally put down their firearms and signed peace treaty with government in 1989. Since then, Mahsan New Village gradually become more and more prosperous. Today, the old zinc-panel houses are replaced with houses with red brick wall and tiles.

The early village chiefs of Mahsan included Zhu Ming, Li Rong, Yang Xi Yuan, Liu Guan Gen, Huang Sheng, Yang Guan Nan, Li Guan Qing, Lu Yu Ye, Lin Jing Xiang. Under the new government, Mahsan is now known as Mahsan New Village Management Committee, and the title ‘Village Chief’ is changed to ‘the Village Chairman’. The present village chairmen are Wang Guang Hui and Pan Han Guang.

The two present village chairmen vowed to be committed in assisting various developments of the village. They hope that it could catch up with times and the residents could live a better, happier, peaceful and contented life.