Andrew & Jasmine Lee [Interview 7 August 2025]
LEE’S EMPORIUM, LEE’S TRAVEL, LEE’S TRAVEL EMPORIUM
Why did your parents move to London, and when?
Lee Hwee Yiow (Dad) was a Teacher in Singapore and focused on Chinese History and Language. He was a City Councillor for the Labour Front Party from 1957, in the Havelock area. When the People’s Action Party (PAP) won the Singapore elections in 1959, he decided to change career and look for other opportunities overseas. There were Commonwealth links between Singapore and the UK, and after receiving a work offer from Chartered Bank, he arrived alone in London aged 28 by ship on 14 th October 1959. He was married to Tan Siang Eng (Mum) with 2 young children.
On 23rd February 1961, Mum arrived by ship into Tilbury Docks after a one month sailing, with her younger brother, and they settled in Islington in North London. She was a midwife in Singapore and had been offered a job in London at a nearby hospital. However, a growing family made this impossible. Their eldest children Serena (5yrs) and Andrew (4yrs) flew over to London later that year on the BOAC airline accompanied with both their Grandmothers and several Uncles and Aunties. They still remember the excitement of the journey and being given a transistor radio each as these were being produced in Singapore at that time.
What do you know about the first years in London?
Dad’s intention was to work in Banking in London but soon after the extended family’s arrival they started a business in North London, close to Green Lanes opening The Chin Chin Chinese Restaurant next to Haringay Stadium; famous for greyhound races (Monday and Friday) and stockcar racing (Saturday). There was also a large coal depot with its many workers nearby.
Mum and Dad learned how to make jam roly poly, rock cakes, roast beef, upside down pudding, scones and other traditional English dishes. The restaurant was very busy on race days, serving English food - bacon rolls, pork chops etc - as well as a variety of typical Chinese dishes like sweet and sour pork, chicken chop suey, noodles and fried rice. There were lots of regulars and the family fitted in well.
Andrew remembers they had to grow their own bean sprouts from mung beans – a key ingredient in Chinese dishes - in containers covered with muslin cloth lining the windowsills in the kitchen.
What do you remember from your childhood?
In Haringay, the family lived and worked on the Grand Parade near Green Lanes. While their parents ran the Chin Chin Cafe, Serena and Andrew went first to Woodlands Park Primary School, where they found the transition to London schooling to be traumatic as they could not speak English well and the teachers did not help with integration. Serena remembers being slapped by a teacher for not wanting to speak. There were very few Chinese children at the school, and they suffered some bullying and racism, even from teachers.
Dad spent evenings with Serena and Andrew teaching them English using English textbooks.
Later on, Andrew went later to Stationers’ Company’s School in Hornsey and Serena to Hornsey School for Girls.
At home the family spoke a mixture of Teochew and English. Teochew was the dialect spoken in Singapore by their family. It originates from the Chaoshan region of eastern Guangdong.
The family was growing, and 4 more children joined the family: John (1959), Adah (1965), Jasmine (1969) and Simon (1970). In Singapore, there was a two-child rule; Jasmine reflects that her dad enjoyed having many children, six in total, and he was proud that he had more than half a football team. She jokes that he thought of them as his workforce.
From the earliest days the elder children were involved in the family business: serving, cleaning, washing and helping out after school and at the weekends and that was before homework could be done.
Why did the family relocate to Kilburn?
In 1971, a business opportunity arose in Kilburn that was irresistible. A parade of shops on Dyne Road had been virtually condemned - firstly because rag and bone men from South Kilburn had been relocated to a yard there (due to the planned 1960s development of the new estate in South Kilburn) and secondly, because of the demolition of Willesden Town Hall in 1970. Both contributed to a reduction in footfall on this street: Dyne Road businesses closed one by one, and the remaining commercial property dropped in value.
A friend of the Lee family from Singapore lived on Dyne Road and alerted Mr. Lee to the availability of these ‘affordable’ shops. Lee’s Emporium opened and became known as the first Chinese grocery store in North West London; it sold “Oriental and Continental Food”. At one point, the Lee family actually owned all the shops in the parade.
What was life like in Kilburn?
The family lived above the shop on Dyne Road. The 4 younger children all attended Christchurch (Church of England) Primary School on Willesden Lane, while Serena and Andrew commuted daily back to Haringay to complete their secondary education.
As time went by the store expanded beyond groceries catering for Irish, Polish and Caribbean locals to more authentic Chinese staples. Andrew remembers the strangest items they sold were cans of curried turtle and Bombay duck, but he can’t remember which nationality of customer bought them.
Saturday was an important day for the shop. It had become known for its fresh fish and live crabs from Billingsgate Fish Market, which were bought early that morning. Andrew vividly remembers going to Billingsgate with his father every week to buy fish for the store.
It was an intense experience, setting off in the dark at 4am, and coming face to face with the hustle and bustle, and bad language he had never heard before. He also remembers the market porters calling his father ‘Charlie’ which obviously wasn’t his name.
They also regularly drove to North London and bought Choi Sum and other Chinese vegetables from a Chinese man who had a large allotment in East Finchley - he specialised in growing these vegetables for the growing Chinese community.
The shop had a growing clientele, attracting customers from all over London and supplying restaurants, the High Commissions and Embassies, as well as student halls of residence with Chinese ingredients and spices.
The whole family were involved in operating the shop and it was very labour intensive. The till needed to be manned, shelves stocked, and floors cleaned. On Saturday mornings, Jasmine helped her sister Adah divide larger commercial quantities of rice, beansprouts and minced pork into smaller quantities more manageable for students. Mrs Lee loved teaching them how to cook dishes like those from back home and always looked forward to hearing how they got on.
Jasmine remembers her sister mopping the shop floor at closing time and a customer knocking on the door asking to collect groceries. Adah told him strictly to remove his shoes to avoid making the floor they had been cleaning dirty again. Dad was horrified with what we were had done as the customer was an important person from the Malaysian High Commission!
From the mid 1970’s, Mr Lee was regularly asked how to source flights to and from Singapore and Malaysia. He realised that this was a business opportunity, so he opened Lee’s Travel from the back office of the Dyne Road shop. In addition, running the shop with more of the children being away studying was becoming a strain.
Being in Kilburn, and the area being predominantly Irish, it felt safe from the IRA terrorist threat to London. Life was hard work, but our parents never complained and showed us how to keep going and to rely on each other.
In 1983 they sold Lee’s Emporium and the Lee Family moved to Shoot Up Hill, Cricklewood, just a stone’s throw away.
What was family life like in Cricklewood?
Once Lee’s Emporium closed, Mrs Lee was able to focus on family and church. Serena married a Singaporean whom she met whilst at University and Andrew married a Malaysian who was studying accountancy in London at the time. Mum was always happiest cooking for her big extended family and friends and often boasted that she had 6 children and only 14 grandchildren!
Mum was particularly active at the Chinese Church in London and steered the Senior Citizens Group inviting them monthly to our home to have a homemade hearty Chinese meal with fellowship and prayer.
Mr Lee was busy establishing Lee’s Travel as a reputable and reliable travel agency specialising in the Far East.
Were you expected to enter the family business?
All the Lee children were encouraged to pursue academic paths and took degrees at university in different subjects. However, during holidays, they were expected to take on active roles in the family businesses. Mr Lee believed in ‘hands on’ experience and Jasmine feels that if this opportunity did not arise, she would not have discovered her passion for becoming a travel agent and loving organising flights and holidays.
Mr and Mrs Lee encouraged the children in new business developments. Andrew and his wife set up Lee’s Wine Emporium on Willesden Lane and ran the off-license there for 10 years - but after an armed robbery, it didn’t feel like a safe place to bring up a family.
How did ‘Lee’s Travel’ come to be?
Customers often asked Mr Lee to recommend travel agents specialising in travel to Asia and before long he decided to enter the travel business. What started as a desk at the back of the grocery store in 1976 grew to become Lee’s Travel. Mr Lee discovered it was a much less labour-intensive business than the grocery store.
Lee’s Travel became Main Agents for Thai Airways, Malaysia Airlines and Singapore Airlines, to name but a few, and established a loyal database of passengers travelling back to the Far East.
Lee’s Travel moved from Dyne Road to Edgware Road as it was more central and made it easier for passengers to visit the agency. Dad never wanted to compete with the other travel agencies based in Chinatown.
Simon and Jasmine took over Lee’s Travel after Dad suddenly passed away in October 1996 and continued to grow the business until 2018 when Lee’s Travel finally closed after 40 years in operation.
How did Lee’s Travel Emporium come to be?
There were two travel agencies within the family; Lee’s Travel and Lee’s Travel Emporium.
Mum always said there was enough business for 2 travel agencies in the family. Lee’s Travel Emporium was started up to fulfil enquiries for passengers wanting to travel to other parts of the world but inevitably they’d be happy to book flights to the Far East too.
What are your links to Singapore now?
There are lots of relatives, friends and past customers who live in Singapore or who have Singaporean heritage and live in London and around the world. The family have regular holiday visits to Singapore to enjoy the local food and practice their Teochew.
Our youngest brother Simon now has a restaurant - Singapore Gardens in Swiss Cottage - serving up the best Singapore Chilli Crab, Satay, Laksa and Chicken Rice.
We still have ‘roots’ there and consider ourselves as Singaporean, even though four of us were born in the UK.
Mum and Dad worked hard on instilling Singaporean as well as Christian traditions and values within the family. We remain very tight knitted.