 Cheong was born the youngest of seven children in Amoy, China.His parents were neutral to his choice of education, when Cheong took to studying art at the Xiamen Academy of Fine Art in 1933.In 1936 Cheong graduated and attended Xinhua Academy of Fine Art in Shanghai for further studies, only to have his education cut short with the breakout of the Sino-Japanese War and the school destroyed by Japanese invaders in 1938.