Kindred SPIRITS

After years of living in the shadow of a traumatic family secret, Preeti and Sellam Nair have arrived at a new lease of life where hopes and dreams thrive alongside their mother-daughter bond.

- CHANDREYEE RAY

When she was 10, Preeti Nair came home from primary school one day and found her mother covering up the unit number on their HDB flat with white paint. "I remember asking why she needed to do that and her telling me not to worry about it," she reminisces.

Preeti and her family would end up moving house nine times over the course of her childhood. What she didn't know then was the reason behind their relocations-the looming threat of loan sharks chasing up on gambling debts owed by her father.

"I had saved up some money from my job as a preschool teacher and stored it in a bank account for my kids to use when they were older, so they would have something to fall back on," says Sellam Nair, Preeti's mother. "It's when we found that all the money had been drawn out that I realised how bad the situation was. We had to go live in my late father's empty house for a period of time because we were pretty much homeless." I am deep in conversation with Sellam and Preeti, sitting in the breezy living room in the spacious home they share with Preeti's brother, Subhas. In front of me is a pot of sweet masala tea Sellam has just brewed, served alongside tiny pistachio and chocolate bites she baked in preparation for Deepavali. I fight the temptation to eat them by the fistfuls as I sip my tea, listening to the mother and daughter pair reflect on their memories. Maxi, their rescue mongrel, stretches out languidly at my feet.

As a child, Preeti had always wanted to go to university. In reality, once she graduated from polytechnic, she decided to get a job right away.

From the moment she started working, Preeti began supporting her family. Unlike the privilege of having their own spending money that many young adults in Singapore enjoy, nearly all of Preeti's income went into paying rent and household bills.