'My friend's death woke me up'

TNP PHOTO: Choo Chwee Hua

He has been in and out of drug rehabilitation centres and jail for various offences since he was a teenager.

Mr Wong Kok Kian (above) is now 42. But after having finally kicked his addiction and recovered from his drug-induced paranoia, he can at least call himself a drug survivor.

Not so his best friend, who also abused the illegal synthetic drug Ice, the street name for methamphetamine.

His friend, whom he nicknamed Ai Zi (Mandarin for shortie), scaled a wall at a HDB block one day in a state of paranoia after taking the drug, and fell to his death.

The incident, which happened more than five years ago, woke Mr Wong up and he was determined to clean up his act so as not to share Ai Zi's fate.