A Singapore love story: how wife's death left a tragic void in Lee Kuan Yew's life
Lee held his wife in such high regard he said he would have been a 'different man' without her
"Without her, I would be a different man, with a different life", the late founding prime minister of Singapore Lee Kuan Yew said in his eulogy for his wife Kwa Geok Choo at her funeral in 2010. It was a testament to the couple's 63-year-long love story.
The two had been fierce rivals in school, at least on Lee's part as he found out that she had beaten him to be the top student in English and economics at the end of the first term when they were both studying at Raffles College.
In 1946, after the Japanese occupation of the Singapore, Lee left to study in Britain. A year later, Kwa, who won a scholarship, also joined him in Britain and read law.
The two married privately in 1947 while both were undergraduates in Cambridge. Three years later, they returned to Singapore and held a formal wedding witnessed by parents and friends.
In 1952, Kwa gave birth to their first son, Lee Hsien Loong, who in 2004 became Singapore's third and incumbent prime minister. Three years later, together with Lee's brother, they set up their own law firm Lee & Lee.
It was at that time when Lee formed the People's Action Party and launched his political career.