Sunday Morning, what to do leh?

I was walking around the house, thinking what I should do on this bright and sunny Sunday Morning. Cut my hair? A bit long but it still can hold onto its root with some shape when a strong wind come whiz by. As I was reaching the balcony I saw the fortune flower stand lonely on one corner. The plant is still strong but the flower shows sign of dying soon, dropping like its previous ancestor. I took out my 400D and take what could be possibly the last photo for this fortune flower.

My Wife Nephew

I was at Bangkok last week and here are some photos of my wife nephew. My wife is chasing after me to post this photo hahaha..as she has not actually seen it.

This is the youngest nephew taken when he was 3 days old. (updated - from 3 years old)

This is him now, totally different.


Below is the older nephew

My Father 2nd year death anniversary on 8th November.

This is the 2nd year and I still felt although it has just happened. Especially when I see an old man walking past who has difficulty in walking. Why not I, be by my father side helping him, lending my shoulder while he was limping, walking around? My father is a stubborn man; he does not even want to use a cane to assist him. I believe I inherited that character of him.

Person or things like health that we have now will always be taken as granted. Why we need to wait until it has been taken away from us before we realize it? There is a lot of “why” post to our own self when it happens. For those who work hard and who uses the excuses that is for the future of the family, I believe that it is not 100% true. There are some “I” and not totally “We” in those excuses. The company will one day stop loving you but the family will not….

Some may asked why do I still recall the sadness from the past. I am trying to use the past to correct the present and the future.

In Life there is no second take.

Yesterday I watch a show acted by Andy Lau called “Wait till you’re older”. I cried at the end of the show, I looked over to my sister and she was also sobbing. Not sure why nowadays I am a bit emotional. I read somewhere that the show is a remake of an English Movie call “Big” starred by Tom Hanks. I have not seen it but I am not sure will it have the same effect on me as the Cantonese version. Hence credits should still be given to the makers of the movie as it manages to find a path to my heart and manages to open up my tear ducts. The show starts with the story line concentrated on Kwong a young boy whose biological mum committed suicide and is living with his “Step” mum.

The fun starts when he drank an aging portion. He woke up as an adult and he enjoys his new found freedom and has some adventure. Along the way he “befriends” his lady teacher and his dad. From chats with his dad as an adult friend he managed to look at issues such as his relationship with his “Step” mom and his father love towards him in a different perspective.

As he grows older day by day he finally forgives his dad and “Step” mom after finding out who is really the 3rd party. He wants to return back to his young self and continue his life hoping to live happily ever after with his dad and his family. Thats where the old uncle (who invented the aging portion) says “Life has no second take”, once you pass it you are unable to go back.

Some say time can mend a broken heart but when something is broken it will forever stay broken. It could be glued up together but it will never be the same. We should do our best to ensure that its remains unbroken, scratch a bit here and there is still alright. Have you ever hold on to buying that particular blouse or shirt that was on displayed hoping for a better bargain later and finally its out of stock and the sense of regret sank it wishing that you should have bought it there and then. I have and I am still doing it…..still have not learnt my lesson….

My Dad First Year Death Anniversary.

My dad passed away a year ago on this same day and month last year. I was at the temple where his ashes lies bottled up in an urn on 28th October, his anniversary according to Chinese calendar. He has been away “vacationing” for a year already. I hope he enjoys his vacation as a man with no illness and no worries. When he is on this part of the world, his left leg used to be very weak, suspected of a minor stroke, hence he walks with a limp. Although we still think of him once in a while especially during a day like this and there are times that we wished he is still around to share with us, our “life achievement” like sitting on our new car but we gotta to do what ever we gotta to do. This is not a permanent separation.

I do remember one sentence my dad told me 2-3 weeks before he passed away suddenly is that he wishes to sit on his own Mercedes Benz one day. We could not buy a Mercedes Benz now but we will buy one when we could. We will then drive around with his picture sitting beside us, wouldn’t it be fun. As we grows older and move along in our life’s without him by our side, I realise there are a lot characters we shared. The way we talked, our expression, the way I walk around after waking up holding my pants. At least we know we have some part of his character living in us.

For those who lose their loved one, who still feels the pain in which I truly understand, I wish to share my thoughts of the matter. Life here is just a facade, a prelude to a much better world in which we will all be in one day. What better way for us to do is to enjoy every minute of our life here as there is no better way for us to remember our love one then to enjoyed ourselves. No love ones of us be it living or “vacationing” would like to see us unhappy or unwell. Do not hold grudges on yourself or others for not doing enough for your love ones. Last year when I was pushed into the operating room and when the anaesthesia hits my system I was totally unconscious, totally black out. I guess this will be the same feeling someone will get when they are on their way to “vacation”, the tunnel in which we travel before reaching the other world. As we crossed that tunnel all things will be left behind, the sadness, the hatred, the grudges, the happiness and etc. All physical objects will no longer exist and we no longer could feel or hold it. It likes a piece of art drawn on a canvas, its colour and contents being slowly wash away, transforming it back to a plain canvas again. Hence there is always no pass but just present.

Weekend Son

As I was searching for a photo for my previous post, I came across a photo of my father. As I look at the photo and show my wife, the feeling of losing my dad last year came back, tears flow freely. I am not sure what god has in mind for him but taking him away actually took a part of me away. I hope my “detoxification” that I have mention in my previous post is effective.

Work has reduced me to just purely a week end “son” to my father as I spend most of my time in overseas project. It has been going on for almost 11 years until my Kidney Cancer turns me into more human, grounding me back at home accompany my father for the last 3 month of his life in this earth as my father. I could not turn back the clock but I hope its serves as a reminder to my friends and colleagues, that they are things that money could not buy, that is the relationship of a father and son.

This is the photo that I was referring to. In this photo my father is actually sewing up his torn shirts, although he has a lot of new shirts in his cupboard but he still prefers to wear this torn shirt. You could see his was smiling as I was coaxing him to look up to the camera…….

Choices

In KL city centre there are a lot of historical buildings or shops that are still operating. Within them, there are numerous small little streets that were meant for pedestrian. There lies a hidden trail that are filled with small little food shops. The best way to know KL city is to goes down to this area, to get a feel of the city pulse.

During lunch time, most of the shops are filled with customer feasting on some mamak fried mee or rice, special fried chicken, fried fish, numerous types of curries accompany with plain rice. This is of course is eat together with their favourite teh tarik, black coffee or sometimes Chinese tea with ice or merely plain boil water. Normally the waiter is some foul mouthed old man that clad the famous pagoda tees, baggy shorts and Japanese slippers.

Most of the customers were from the surrounding offices, they are there to fill up their stomach after spending the first half of the day maybe crammed in some small office space working. Across the street, whereby a much newer ultra modern building stands there are numerous food stores that are air conditioned, that probably serves water from a green bottle that was overly priced and you are most likely serve by a smartly dressed black and white waiters or waitress that looks like is ready for a ball. The shops might be offering some thai fried rice in pineapple or some steaks or food that was so nicely decorated that by eating them is a sin.

Within these 2 highly contrast shops there lies a 2 groups of customer, one that is enjoying its food accompany by the sound of taxis and bus honking and probably the food comes along with some dust. And another that is sitting in nice comfy environment with Kenny G playing from the piped in speakers. Both of these groups make different choices. Their choices might be due to the “restriction” of their income but they are there to do one thing that is to fill up their stomach, feeding their body with enough energy to last them for the other half of the day.

All of us are heading towards the same ending, but some chooses to stop a while on the side to smell the flowers and some chooses to speed across without looking around. All of us arrive at the same finish line; we choose to arrive by different routes and way. I am not sure how long the distance that I have to go, it might be short or it might be long but “A” or Sis if you read this, I choose to spend it wisely with you guys although sometimes I might be a bit hot headed and stubborn but I am still learning to choose and live wisely. My mom and dad has reached there first they are waiting for us but I am choosing a path that is filled with flowers for me to smell, so they might be waiting a bit longer but I think they do not mind.

Income Tax and the lingering pains….

I have just completed my income tax form. This is the first year of the self assessment system. I have quite a struggle in doing so. The first hurdle was that it was in Bahasa (Malaysian Language) all the while I received an English version. I almost failed my Bahasa subject during my secondary school exams. Now I need to understand the words that were in the form in order for me to “invest” in the government. I called practically almost daily for the past few days to the Tax department to enquire, to just understand on what some items meant.

In the progress I found out that I still owe them in total of Rm8K including my wife’s. It was a shock to me as I have been receiving statement and all the while it shows credit balance. I guess I will need to pay a personal visit to the tax department to clear it up. Even for this year assessment I owe them in total of Rm5K including my wife. I will need to tighten my belt and eat less to pay them up.

When I reached the row D2 which was on parents medical, I felt a tingle of sadness. This will be the last year that I will be entering it. As I flipped through the medical receipt which my dad has passed to me, I was practically holding back my tears. It has been more than 5 months since he left us but I still feel the loss and the vacuum in my heart, it still ache. Human has always behaves this way, when we are in possession of something, we always treat it as our god gives rights but when we loss it, we feel the pain, the longings. I used to have a father that I could talked to and now all I have is the memories. We do argue once in a while but…..my earphone now is playing a Beyond songs. The songs that was famous after its lead singer was killed in an accident. It said each day we meet, we talked, we laughed and now I need to depart…I think I will stop before the tears starts to roll down from my eyes again…..

Don't count the years , count the memories

When festive season arrive, you will normally think of your love one. I will not be celebrating this Chinese New Year as my dad passed away 3 months ago. Chinese tradition says that there should be no celebration for a year. My family now consists of only my sister, my wife and myself. My mum passed away since I am 21 years old due to tongue cancer. I myself was diagnosed as having kidney cancer in Aug last year, now I am left only with my right kidney.

I normally shop at Jusco xxxx. I will always walk the same way every time I am there. When I walked pass the counter that is selling Polo T-shirts, it reminds me of my dad. I always buy him some polo t-shirts for Chinese New Year. I used to call him “So Fun” as he is a happy go lucky guy. In Chinese there is a saying “Treat it as blanket if the sky drop”, that’s how my dad always look at things, no matter what happened he will look at it in a simple manner. He seldom get angry, in fact I do not remember the last time he is angry. I guess me and my sister are the hot headed one.

I guess it’s hard sometimes to let go. I remember when my mom passes away it takes a while for me and my sister to move on. Now I am 16 years older, the pain and the feelings of trying to let go still remains the same. The only difference is that when my mom passed away I felt relief and happy for her initially as she was having quite a “painful” few months before she pass away and then follows by emptiness and sorrow. My dad “departure” was a shock to us, it happens just within a day.

Every one of us will have to go sooner or later; this life is just mid way to another life. I am not sure when it’s my turn and how but I hope that I will go the same way as my dad, fast and easy. In one of my previous post, there is a good wording, “Don’t count the years, count the memories”. I will always remember the good ones, so long "So Fun", thanks for the memory.