The Last Of The Great Doctors of Kota Bharu

Remember these pictures from my blog Kota Bharu In Pictures Part 3?

The clinic is still operating but I wonder if Dr. Bates is still seeing his patients there. I think Dr. Bates is a former British citizen who settled in Kelantan a long time ago. Will somebody from Kota Bharu enlighten me?

J.T. said...
Hi Zawi

Wow.. more familiar names of the KB. As mentioned in my blog, Bates Dispensary is the one place I remember most among others. I am not sure what happened to the Bates family after we left KB. My parents knew Dr Robert Bates. If my parents were alive today, I would call them immediately to ask about Dr Bates and how he got to KB to set up his practice.Medo photo studio sounds familiar. I think that is where our family and personal photos were taken. I need to check the back of some old photos. It has been too many years. :)Oh Zawi, even with limited memory of KB, I could go on and on about some of the street names and who and what I remember of those places. Thanks for another walk down memory lane.
Monday, January 28, 2008
Zawi said...
j.t.

I think Dr. Bates is still around. Email me your fathers name so that I can use that name to tickle Dr. Bate's memory of the old times when I approach him to allow me to do a write up on him.Did take a picture of the Merican Dispensary at the corner of the shop near to Bazaar MPKB. Dr Ezanee was the proprietor but I doubt that he is still practicing as the last time I saw him, his eyesight was so bad that he could hardly see. That was a decade ago.The joy is mutual j.t. Me happy to make somebody like you happy :). Please come back to Kota Bharu.I will check on your site about the Dr. Bates.

Those were the exact posting on my Blog about Kota Bharu In Pictures Part 3.I was presumptious when I made the remark that Dr. Bates was a Brit. Dr. Bates is an Australian.

That was what triggered the desire to blog about the doctors of Kota Bharu. Yes, J.T. of Jaqui's Curve who commented on the above pictures that did it. Anyway it was so long ago that I promised her to blog about it and it is only now that I get to do it. It wasn't an easy task really as my only personal aquaintance with Dr. Bates was a visit to his clinic once for my hypertension. That too was a long time ago. I could not really figure as to how receptive Dr. Bates will be to the idea.

In later interactions with J.T. I found out that her family had a close mutual family friend who is a lawyer by the name of Foo. Hey that brings the connection. Mr.Foo Say Ghee is my ex teacher's husband. Via Yahoo Messenger I solicited Mrs. Foo's help to send words to Dr. Bates of my intention to write about him. At a chance meeting with Dr. Bates, Mrs.Foo poked the proposal to which Dr. Bates asked her why should anybody wants to write anything about him?. Mrs. Foo was wise enough to answer that he was the last of the Greats which is exactly right and that gave me the idea for the topic of this blog. Anyway Mrs. Foo got the greenlight for me and conveyed to me that Dr. Bates wants me to see him anytime in the afternoon as he has less patients at such a time.

That was still along time ago. I still didn't have the courage to go and see him to ask him probing questions pertinent to what I had in mind. I had exactly nothing in my mind so how on earth would I know what to ask of him? The most important thing is to find out why on earth that he set up shop in Kota Bharu such a long time ago when the place was just a tiny dot on the map of Malaysia.

Finally barely a month ago my friend Datuk Dr. Mahmud Awang Kecik, a urologist and former surgeon at Ampang Puteri Specialist Hospital was down in Kota Bharu and he called me for lunch. After exhausting all ideas to talk about, I broached to him about my idea to sort of interview Dr. Bates. I told him I was having problem on how to break the ice with him. Smilingly Dr. Mahmud asked me to take him to see Dr. Bates. They are aquaintance!

It was some 38 years ago that a young boy of 19 years of age by the name of Mahmud Awang Kechik had come to see Dr. Bates to get his health certified. This was a prerequisite for him to enter medical College under the Colombo Plan. Later when Dr. Mahmud had qualified and became a doctor in Kota Bharu they get aquainted again. So I came with a mutual friend to see Dr. Bates. The meeting between two close friends was a happy one as Dr. Bates had been trying to locate Dr. Mahmud for sometimes. I recorded it on camera. After that it was easy for me to personally tell him about my project to which he said you can come and see me any time.

Datuk Dr. Mahmud, not a practitioner anymore but a successful businessman on the international scene.

Dr. Mahmud posing with Dr. Bates.Two good friends reunited.

On 9th August 2008 I went to see Dr. Bates again to get some basic informations about Dr. Bates. He was in a hurry so I had to work very fast to get some basic informations about him.

Dr. Thomas James Bates graduated as a doctor from Adelaide University Asutralia. It was also there that he met a Miss Yeip I Bee an Art student from Kelantan. The young Dr. Bates had fallen head over heel for Miss Yeip. His proposal for her hands in marriage was accepted on the express condition that they get married and live in Kota Bharu.

The love was so strong that Dr. Bates readily complied and thus in 1968 he opened up a private clinic in Kota Bharu. When his parents were alive they used to to travel to Australia to meet them. Since they have both died, there is nothing much to go back to anymore. Malaysia is home to Dr. Bates and his family. From his marriage, he has two children, Steven and Christopher. Steven is the head of anaesthetist in a hospital in London whereas Chris is a dentist working in Singapore.

When I mentioned JT to Dr. Bates he remembered her as a small child of a certain height which he gestured with his hand. That was that long ago. JT remembered Steven as the leader who lead her siblings to Church in Kota Bharu.

Of the five pioneering private clinics in Kota Bharu, The Bates Dispensary is the only clinic that is still going with its founding doctor still practicing. The others like Aziz Clinic was closed soon after the demise of Dr. Aziz. The picture below shows where the location of Aziz Clinic near the Kota Bharu Bus stand. Mrs Lim, an avid reader of my blogs who used to live five doors away from Aziz Clinic and she confirmed the location of this place as the former Aziz Clinic, which is now a phone shop. The shophouse where Mrs. Lim's family used to live in is now a convenience store of the 7 Eleven chain..

Aziz Clinic was located where the phone shop is after the Super Roti.

Another clinic that is still operating is The Merican Dispensary belonging to the late Datuk Dr. Ezanee located not far from The Bates Dispensary. I remember going to his clinic once and had the chance to be examined by the good doctor himself. His sight was so bad that his glasses was almost an inch thick. On top of that he still had to use the magnifying glass to write. Despite all that many loyal patients insist to be examined by Datuk Dr. Izanee himself.

The Merican Dispensary is located infront of Bazaar MPKB.

A close doctor friend of mine used to work for Merican Dispensary. It was good business while he was working there but he was not happy with his salary. He experienced the wrath of Datuk Dr.Izanee when he proposed that he be paid on per patient basis instead of a fixed amount. This young doctor later set up his own clinic in Gua Musang and made his fortune there.

I don't have much information about the other two great doctors by the name of Dr. Ng Oon Hwee who owned Victory dispensary and Dr Choo Eng San who also had a clinic in Kota Bharu. Both have ceased operation. Of the two only Dr. Ng is still alive and he is living in Singapore.

Kota Bharu had quite a number of expatriates family back then and these are Dr. Bates major clientele. I have met a few of them such as Datuk Wrigglesworth who was a lawyer. He came to visit my foster father the late Raymond Hall when I was staying with him when I was schooling for three months in Sultan Ismail College Kota Bharu. During that time my foster father brought me to see another expatriate ex planter residing in Kota Bharu.

English was well spoken by the people of Kota Bharu then so Dr. Bates had no problem communicating with his patients. Over the years Dr. Bates caught up with the local dialect and converse well with them in the Kelantanese dialect. The locals have faith in him as a good doctor. I remember my wife's late grandmother insisting on to be taken to see Dr. Bates whenever she was ill.

Mrs Foo my ex teacher reminded me of another Indian Doctor by the name of Dr. Aru who set up clinic almost opposite to Dr. Bates Dispensary. He was a comtemporary of Datuk Dr. Izanee of Merican Dispensary meaning that he set up clinic even earlier than Dr. Bates himself. His family moved away from Kota Bharu after his death.

Beside medical doctors Mrs Foo recalled two private dentists by the names of Dr. Chiam (deceased) and Dr. Wee who opened up private practice from the 50's. She remembered Dr. Chiam as a thourough person who would look into every nook and corner of the her mouth. Using the foot powered drill (never had the chance to see one myself), Dr. Chiam would drill every cavity however minute. She remembered the pain to have reached the 'bone and the head'. No wonder Mrs. Foo still has her own set of teeth as the fear of another drilling even with the latest laser drill made her look after them well. The thought of going to the dentist bring shivers down her spine.

These are the great doctors that had served in Kota Bharu. Dr. Bates is still serving after 40 years at it. If it was money that these doctors were looking for, then Kota Bharu was a wrong choice. So money wasn't the main criteria for them. Service was and still is paramount.

Looking hale and hearty, I guess Dr. Bates will continue to serve his patients for many more years to come. He is the last of the great doctors of Kota Bharu who is still serving.