I went to a young adult camp last weekend to relax but it was anything but relaxing. There were four sessions packed in two days and each session lasted two hours. I had to doodle to keep myself awake (as seen above). Anyway, I don’t like talking about camp.
Visited a rabbit/deer/donkey farm on Sunday, but the animals were in a very sad state—which is not an unusual sight since many countries exploit animals for tourism. But still, it doesn’t justify. I found two very sick rabbits (due to over-handling and stress) lying on the ground with sand in its eyes and mouth:
A healthy bunny inspecting the soon-to-be-dead bunny:
Here’s a very friendly and jealous donkey (he pushed his friends away from me so I only take pictures of him). I wanted to stroke his head but he kept twitching and then I realized he’s infested with ticks and flies. And then there’s the deer with horrible skin problems.
I'm pretty much brain-dead over the past few days and to make it worse, I'm suffering from a backache. I’m supposed to finish two reviews but my mind won’t register, my fingers won’t start typing and my body won’t obey. Everything seems so numb these days. I don’t know if this weekend’s break would be great either. The only thing I have looking up for me is my new roll of slide film for my holga.
My home modem died so I have to do this at work.
We picked her bones up with chopsticks and placed them into the porcelain jar yesterday. It was weird seeing her remains all burnt up and looking like sand and debris. It’s so dead. It’s like a hermit crab that left its shell empty in search of a bigger shell… life no longer inhabits it.
I also bought some pink and white orchids from the market. I don’t really know why I wanted them, but I felt better after I placed them in the house. That’s my cat being a busybody.
The other night, my cousins and I were swapping stories over the huge pot of flaming ‘hell money’ (literally). We shared about what we used to do together when we were younger, all the fun games we used to play and pranks we pulled on others. When it was getting late, we sprawled ourselves on our grandma’s mattress, giggling about boyfriends and funny pictures. Unknowingly, our grandma’s demise bridged the great divide age made for us. After many awkward years, we shared a common experience again.
I came in for work this morning to find the new Yeah Yeah Yeahs CD on my desk and it picked me up. I'm also glad that the new Flatfish website I illustrated is up, thanks to the bearded geeks behind all that programming. I guess I will be fine.
And thank you, my geographically distant friend, for ringing me up. It meant a lot. Ok, goodnight.
She was born to a small Teochew village in China in the beginning of autumn 1930. Less than a year later, her parents traded four seasons for the tropics when they brought her to Malaya. She grew up in a shop-house above a multi-purpose grocery store in Kuala Lumpur where she met her first love. His family owned the shop downstairs as well as a chain of other shops scattered around town. Back then, Kuala Lumpur was a growing city with many Chinese business men. Many have no choice but to walk, some rode the trishaw, others cycled and only three families owned a car. His family was one of them.
During the Japanese occupation, she hid in a gunnysack in the grocery shop as Japanese soldiers search each floor, capturing the men and killing the women. One pregnant lady had her stomach sliced through cleanly with a bayonet, leaving her child free-falling between her legs, umbilical chord still attached. A loud thud hit the wooden flooring above followed by what sounded like someone emptying out a bag of watermelons. Some smashed to the ground while others rolled.
Her marriage to the shopkeeper’s son was anything but happy. Besides being a heavy drinker and a womanizer, he was also diabetic. Every morning, she would fix him a shot of insulin on his thigh before he set off to work. After much ‘entertaining’ business, he would return home pissed drunk and totally incapable of holding a normal conversation without raising his voice. She was not too patient either, as a teacher, raising her voice was part of her job requirement. When she was too tired of his misdemeanour, she became her own private eye and found him with an arm around another woman. Armed with her sewing scissors, she reached for the woman’s hair. But that was only to scare her husband, who then sheepishly followed her home.
She was always fighting something. She fought for her husband when he was too tired to fight for her, she fought for her four children when he died and left them with only $2000, she fought for her son when he was mentally ill, she fought for her own mother when she became bed-ridden and she fought for her own life when she was diagnosed with her first cancer. But on Saturday morning, she was too tired to fight for herself. After feeding her water from a syringe, I saw her chest rise and fall and rise and fall and rise and fall and slowing down and down and down and finally still.
And then there were tears in her eyes. She finally found the peace she was fighting for.
My family gave her a Buddhist funeral although she accepted Jesus without their knowledge. So last night we burnt her a mansion with four maids, two Mercedes, a mahjong set, an Astrg dish (decoder, remote control and flat-screen TV included), a handphone (without 3G, that would be too complicated for her), gold and silver mountains and loads of cash. It was engulfed in a flame that was almost 10’ high and then fell into a million pieces from the sky like glowing golden snowflakes, disappearing as they reach the ground. I hope my memory of her will not be like that, burning fast dying young. I want it to last as long as I live because that is the only living part of her left with me.
And I miss her so much.
This is one of my favourite pictures of her
She loved sewing
At a school, with a very spiffy bag
Four years after she became my grandma, Thailand
---
I’d like to thank those who visited, called and smsed. I’m sorry that I didn’t reply some of your messages, but I really appreciate your thoughts and kind words.
How could you love me the same way you love him?
All my decaying teeth hanging limp
A tongue wedged between a truth and a lie
When push comes to shove
You are a volcano waiting to explode
Holy Ghost, everything goes
Holy Ghost, everything goes
(missing the ark,
