I heard about the demise of Soo Kiaw just after the news of Olive Lee’s death came. Soo Kiaw would have been about 58 this year. She had worked at the National Library Board having spent time at Queenstown Branch Library and Cataloguing. She resigned and joined the Institute of Systems Science (ISS) to head its resource centre. She was associated with ISS Resource Centre for many years, running the library very much as a one-woman show. She had charted the ISS Resource Centre from its early days and saw it change as the main organization morphed from Kent Ridge Digital Laboratory (KRDL) to Institute for Infocomm Research (I2R). I believe she was very much a survivor who was able to cope with the changes in environment, bosses and users.
I met her quite a few times when she came to the NUS Central Library to search for information for her users at ISS. I still remember her slim frame, always well-dressed and well-groomed. She was usually working hard on behalf of her users and very often with the constraints of a short time frame. She impressed me with her willingness to go the extra mile for her users and her willingness to learn about new sources to keep updated on her chosen profession.
I understand that she had been active in the Lions Club of Singapore Phoenix. She had even been a past president of the club. It certainly goes to show her nature that she was active in volunteer work.
I found Soo Kiaw a very pleasant person to deal with and she always left a good impression.
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Contributed by Yeo Pin Pin