WHAT sad news, indeed, to hear of former Straits Times deputy editor Felix Soh's death ("'Titan of ST newsroom' dies at 63"; Monday).
I met Felix in the mid-1990s, when I was teaching journalism at the Nanyang Technological University and he was The Straits Times' foreign editor.
From the start, he came across as being hopelessly devoted to newspaper work.
One time, he told me he had never woken up and not looked forward to going to work - except he didn't call it "work".
It was a calling he embraced almost gleefully. Every day was a new challenge and an adventure, he said, and he simply loved going into the newsroom to face whatever came his way. Lucky man with a passion, I thought.
As his former colleagues and friends have said so eloquently, Felix was an influential leader in The Straits Times newsroom and beyond.
He was also generous to fellow newshounds. He welcomed me, a US-trained journalist, into The Straits Times newsroom to work part-time as one of his sub-editors, so that I could see first-hand the nightly operations of the foreign desk and how he worked.
That was a free pass to a friend, for which I shall always be grateful. The Straits Times has lost a fine, fine newsman.
Tan Lai Kim
Boston
