Four-digit lottery (Singapore)

Google: Quote Toto was established to control widespread illegal gambling in Singapore during the 1960s. Unquote

In the ‘60s, people in Singapore were playing a form of four-digit lottery with numbers chosen by themselves.  All I knew at the time as a child was that it seemed to be run by private groups, as it was all a bit hush hush — I’d get sent by the grown-ups to a side door of someone’s house (the syndicate head?), hand over the slip of paper with the permutations and other instructions (how many days/weeks to be repeated, etc.), plus the money.

    The inspiration for the four digits could be anything, most commonly a new born baby/puppy/kitten.  Each digit would be written on a small square of paper, scrunched up, thrown in the path of the baby/puppy/kitten.  Whichever number was grabbed/sniffed by the picker would get written down, in that order or switched around in different permutations for more chances of winning.

    We lived by a main road, on a straight stretch.  One day, some roadworks were being carried out in the section outside our house.  When they went off for the evening, the workers placed a barrier around the hole they’d dug, and hung a little blinking light on it.  Around 3am, a car came speeding down that straight stretch.  The driver (probably young and male) saw the barrier and light too late, swerved last minute and the car flipped over onto its top, with a loud bang.  It woke everyone up, we all rushed out to take a look, talked about it for a few minutes, and went back to bed.  

    My brother somehow managed to sleep through it.  When the lottery results came out, the four digits were the same ones as the car’s registration number but backwards.  My brother was very cross when he heard about the accident later that evening, saying if he’d seen that the car had flipped over, he’d have taken down the number and reversed it — and won the lottery!

(Singapore, 1960s/70s)