The 82-year-old cheerleader who dances to the beat of her own drum

Madam Rosalind Koh's schedule is packed like someone in their 30s or 40s, only the activities are somewhat different. She is constantly on the move after getting up at 6am and is off to various appointments including meals with friends, teaching gigs and maybe even some karaoke. 

She is showing no signs of slowing down and she is 82 years old.

When she gets to bed at 10pm, like many younger people, she is looking at her mobile phone screen until she falls asleep past midnight. 

“I’m up tinkering with my phone, looking at photos and replying to messages,” she said, flashing a grin, a glint in her eyes that were lined with a bright aquamarine colour.

Even though she usually gets just six hours of sleep, she is up on the dot and ready for yet another energetic day, which starts with dance and singing classes.

On Monday, it is Chinese dance, Tuesday fun dance, Wednesday vogue dance, Thursday line dancing and on Friday, she is teaching dance and singing lessons to seniors.

On weekend mornings, she takes singing lessons at the Hainan Association on Saturdays and folk dance lessons on Sundays.  

In the afternoons, there may be a game or two of Rummy-O (a version of the Rummikub game played with tiles instead of cards), a session of karaoke singing and a meeting with friends to chat over a meal.

On other afternoons, she teaches seniors English, singing or dance exercises.

“Everybody always asks me, ‘Don’t you feel tired? You have back-to-back programmes',” Mdm Koh said, shrugging while flashing me her megawatt smile during an interview earlier this week. 

“But really, I don’t feel tired."

Mdm Koh taught English as a secondary school teacher for close to 40 years.

“When I retired, I was afraid I would have nothing to do. However, I became quite busy soon after,” she added.

I met her in the late afternoon on Monday (Apr 7) while she was having a dress rehearsal for her latest endeavour, cheerleading. She is part of a 60-member senior team and is its oldest member. 

The team is a wellness initiative for seniors by Aspire55, a social health club for those over the age of 50, and its sister company Ageing Asia.

Last year, the same group performed a drumming routine.

Before our interview, I watched as their instructor worked through their choreography. They were set to perform at the Marina Bay Expo & Convention Centre for the World Ageing Festival held on Apr 8 and 9.

The room was buzzing with chatter and pom-poms were fluttering mid-practice.

Over the microphone, the voice of choreographer Jie Ying Nah, founder of Tinydancer Productions, boomed as she instructed the team to listen to the music cues for their entrance.

Looking at the many pairs of neon orthopaedic shoes and heads full of salt-and-pepper hair, I still could not believe that Mdm Koh was the oldest among them.

She was dressed in a bright coral top adorned with a string of pearls the size of large grapes and earrings that shimmered and clacked when she spoke.

As much as she has the gift for teaching, she shines brightest when she is learning.

During rehearsal, Mdm Koh kept her eyes fixed on Ms Nah, watched for her cue, marched on the spot and waved her pom-poms energetically – her smile never leaving her face. 

Her bedazzled shoes caught the light ever so often, while her floral lace socks peeked out from under the ankle line of her shoes. 

Although it might seem like Mdm Koh has an incredible passion for dance, she told CNA TODAY that it is not the case.

For the octogenarian, dance is merely a vehicle to keep her on her toes and make new friends.

“This way, I belong to a group with similar interests and I have many friends,” she said.

“It also pushes me to learn new things because I have this fear of getting dementia.

"It also gives me an excuse to dress prettily,” she said with a laugh. 

'DIRT-POOR' BEGINNINGS, ORPHANED IN HER TEENS

It’s hard to imagine that someone who now lives – and dresses – in technicolour began life in such stark contrast.

Born into poverty, Mdm Koh lost her parents to cancer along with her grandparents, all within two years of each other. 

At 16 and the oldest of four sisters, she suddenly found herself in charge of a household when her youngest sibling was just five years old.

“We were dirt-poor,” she said. “My mother would pick up oranges from the road, cut away the rotten parts and feed them to us.”

She recalled how she and her sisters “ate bread more than anything else".

During our interview, she chose not to linger on the details of those early days after her parents died, but she did describe how the community supported her family by helping to pay for the funeral and, most remarkably, how one stranger changed everything for her.

In her first year at the Teacher’s Training College, she was approached by a man on campus while she was wearing an all-black outfit with a small piece of black cloth attached to her sleeve to signify that she was in mourning for the deaths of her parents and grandparents.

“Maybe I must have looked like quite a pitiful figure standing alone,” she said of why he approached her. 

That man turned out to be the late Rudy Mosbergen, the first principal of Raffles Junior College and a former Olympian who represented Singapore in hockey. 

When he found out that she was in mourning, he arranged for church rations to be sent to her family.

He also checked on her to ensure that she finished the teaching course and got her to join tutorials at the church to keep up with her schoolwork.

“He didn’t know me, but he took care of us. He brought us food and books. He ensured I finished my teacher training. I’m forever grateful,” Mdm Koh said. 

At 19, she started her practicum teacher training at the now-defunct McNair Primary School for six years.

She then moved to First Toa Payoh Secondary School, followed by Ahmad Ibrahim Secondary School where she taught both English language and English literature.

In 1980, she transferred to Chai Chee Secondary School where she taught for 20 years before retiring in 2001.

Her favourite book to teach was Harper Lee's To Kill a Mockingbird and former students who bump into her on the streets often quote lines back to her.

Mdm Koh joked that she looks more or less the same, but her students have grown and changed a lot, making it hard for her to recognise them sometimes.

Once, she recalled, a man approached her on the street and said: “You look like a picture."

It is a line from the novel, something the character Atticus Finch said to the cantankerous Mrs Dubose. 

“That’s how I knew he had been one of my students,” she said, beaming.

“Looking back (at my life and difficult childhood years), I feel that I'm blessed. As I said, there must be a reason why God took away my parents at such a young age.”

At 7.30am on a Tuesday, on my second day interviewing Mdm Koh, I arrived at the halls of Marina Bay Sands Expo & Convention Centre, which were already stirring with activity. 

The festival stalls were getting last-minute touches and backstage chatter from the senior cheerleaders hummed through the air.

While I was bleary-eyed and groggy, Mdm Koh and her team were raring to go. Clad in their costumes, which included pleated skirts that swished with every step, they snapped group photos and touched up their makeup.

When I spotted Mdm Koh, she was even more dolled up than usual. She was wearing a sparkly headband, red dangling earrings and a curled hairpiece clipped on just right. 

“I’m so excited and very nervous, too," she said, adding that she slept at 2.45am. 

"The whole night, I didn’t sleep properly.

“We had a bit of rehearsal, but it can still be a little worrying even with rehearsal. You might forget the steps sometimes,” she added.

Soon enough, it was time for the performance and it went exactly as planned, with the crowd cheering and mobile phones going up in the air as the audience captured the moment.

Filled with adrenaline from the performance, Mdm Koh bounced off the stage towards me. 

“It’s so much fun,” she exclaimed. “You truly feel energetic with the large crowd and everyone clapping. We feel great. Honestly, I feel happy.”

Not missing a beat, she picked up her bag, still clad in her cheerleader uniform, to take the train and make her way to an active ageing centre for her afternoon karaoke and Rummy-O game. 

At the active ageing centre in Bedok North, Mdm Koh changed her attire to a Hawaiian-print blouse tucked into a swishy, deep violet mini skirt. She also had on a strand of matching pearls and amethyst earrings that nearly grazed her shoulders. 

I asked whether people commented about her vibrant outfits and she nodded fervently.

“Sometimes, they criticise how I dress, saying, ‘Oh, you’re so old you cannot wear that … you must wear dull colours. You cannot be trendy. Your hairstyle must be the old-fashioned type and you cannot wear nice earrings like these.”

Calling her critics “old-fashioned”, Mdm Koh said: “I don't bother about them.” 

Some people take it easy during retirement, but Mdm Koh would rather be going full steam ahead.

“I was so busy working in my 20s and 30s, there was no time to play,” she said.

“Now is the time to play. Now, I can do things I enjoy and even make others happy.”

Her son and daughter, both in their 50s, and her four grandsons aged between 13 and 23 support her active lifestyle. Her son lives in the same housing block as her.

Mdm Koh's husband died 14 years ago from cancer. 

“It’s important I keep myself active and healthy because this way, I'm helping my children. I'm not a burden to them,” she said.

Although she is bold and confident most of the time, there are some fears that creep into the back of Mdm Koh's mind. She said that she is not afraid of death but rather of being alone. 

“I’m scared to be completely alone without friends, without anybody. I’m so used to being surrounded by people and the thought of being alone really worries me.”

At 4pm, the Rummy-O table and the centre shut for the day. We took a break at Mdm Koh's flat nearby and she prepared a quick dinner of eggs and homegrown herbs before her Chinese dance class later in the evening. 

Photos of her smiling and her signature megawatt grin, posing from her many travels – to Kashmir, Japan and China with her family, sisters and friends – lined the walls of her flat, each a memory to which she fondly returns.

For Mdm Koh, age is a number and you are only as "old" as you let yourself be.

“I don't feel old at all. Some people may be 50, but they behave like they're 80 and don't want to go out,” she said.

“I think I’m living life to the fullest. I’m very contented and very happy.”