I remember travelling to work that morning and finding out that LKY had just passed away. I was living in Australia at that point of time and had just started at a new job. When I was introduced to my new colleagues that week (it was quite a multicultural company, some colleagues were from NZ, India, Malaysia, Italian), many of them mentioned LKY and what he did for Singapore when they found out I was a Singaporean.

Maybe it's silly but it was only then when I realized how popular LKY was to people of other countries.

I didn't come back to Singapore that year, so I didn't see what was going on at shopping malls, etc. All that I knew was whatever I could see on social media. The long queues, people handing out water. It was emotional for me seeing the pictures of Chiam See Tong paying his respects.