October132009
4th minute
“Since I was young I was raised by my grandparents. Grandma washed the dishes and the clothes, and brought us to the school bus. Grandpa watched TV, listened to the radio, played with his torch lights, answered the phone. Auntie called everyday to look for grandma and he would pick up. If she called thrice, he would bluff her thrice. Tell her grandma’s not home, she went to Johor. Grandma went on a holiday. Grandma disappeared. Grandma.. “I don’t know where I left her!” Grandpa also liked to play around with his six grandkids and grandma would scold him “you anyhow say”.
He would say, “You silly, you stupid, you ‘ben ben’. Go to the market and buy me satay and durian! And the satay, don’t buy pork… buy the dragon meat satay, it tastes better.”
Grandpa liked to play around with us, and grandma scolded him every time.
He also liked torch lights very much.
Every night, in the dead of the night, he would take a torch to the toilet. Before he got there he’d come into my room. To turn off the fan.
Whether or not I was sleeping he’d scold me, “you silly, the fan is on such high speed, and you’re inside the blanket. What’s the fan blowing at? your head?”
I should have told him, “if I didn’t do that, I wouldn’t be able to sleep every night with that torch on my face.”
In his 81 years what he loved most were three things. Torch lights, alarm clocks, radios.
I guess you could say I’m the laziest grandchild out of all six of them. I can sleep all day and not go to school. Dad, mum, grandma would give up on waking me up for school. So the job fell to him. How’d I know he had 100s of alarm clocks by his bed. Every morning if I didn’t wake up for school he’d put 8 alarm clocks next to me… and make them ring at the same time. If I still didnt’ wake up, he’d sit in his room and call my mobile phone and say, “you woman, why do you sleep so much? it’s 10pm! school’s over and you havent gone!”
These last years that I was abroad. Every time I packed to leave granny would worry I haven’t had enough clothes and underwear. Grandpa would worry I didn’t have enough torch lights. Whether I went to India or anywhere else, he’d give me a torch each time. And my bag…he’d tie ribbons all over them. Pink ones.”
October62009
"In most mythologies the heavens rained down when something earth-shattering happened. In the Chinese one, Cangjie invented Chinese characters and the “ghosts and deities cried, and the sky rained millet”. What, the prize for inventing the hardest language to write is more food? That settles it, then. We descendants of the Yellow Emperor were meant to be nerds and gluttons. At the same time. I certainly am.
When I was 10, my Chinese teacher would tell us that if we can read and write Chinese characters, we can pretty damned well do anything. I’m still trying to believe her.
"
想跟你妈说的话 (Things I Want to Say to Your Mother)
（一年前）
今早你从你家楼下上来跟我说这一年来最怕听的一句话：”我妈问。。我们两之间的关系是不是。。。”
这个问题根本就是很简单的一题，也有简单的一种答案。是。就是。。”那种”。当你最亲爱的人一边问她不想问的，每个母亲不要得问得，又一边哭泣，不就是不想听真实又只能达到那个不是答案得答案。妈，你别多思。妈，你在说什么。妈，我们是。。好朋友。而已。
这年以来我每当去你的国家探望时，都住你的，吃你的。睡当然也是睡你的。她不想知道的是若你家有足够的客人房间，明明有两张床，我们为何要在同一张床睡呢？又是，若我是国外来的，又怎么每星期左右来一，有时两次？我们为何总要一起出国，在这年内去泰国两次，去东马的小村，印尼，还去了伦敦和西班牙？她最厌问的是今早的那句话：”上个月我把你们的门敲开后看到你们两拥抱地。。睡着在一起。”
你在那刹那间差点儿说出真实，但和我上个月想跟父母说时同样地：话离不了口。
有机会的话下一次我会鼓起勇气跟你母亲说：”阿姨，您的女儿是我的唯一，我的未来，也是我的世界。她是我短短二十二年里很不容易才找出来的宝，她的爱是我的幸福。您的同意或不同意不会改变我们的爱，但您的祝福会改变一切。”
我会跟你妈说圣经说 “爱是恒久忍耐，又有恩慈。爱是不嫉妒，不自夸，不张狂。”我会说我们是恒久久忍耐，又有恩慈。我们的爱也并没有嫉妒，自夸，或张狂。
我会跟你妈说：”要我等一年，两年，三，四或十年也可以。我有时间，我可以等。因为我爱您的女儿，并会爱她一辈子。”
“请让我们吧。”
[translated]
a year ago
This morning you came up from downstairs bearing the news we’d feared hearing this past year: “My mother asked.. if our relationship was..”
This question is really a simple one, one with an equally simple answer. Yes. Yes, precisely. It is precisely that sort. But when the person closest to you asks the question she doesn’t want to know the answer to, the one that every mother doesn’t want to have to ask, while tearing at the same time, isn’t it then the sort of question whose answer she doesn’t want to hear? Mother, you said, don’t think too much about it, what are you taking about. When you wake up you’ll stop thinking about this. We’re.. friends. Only.
Each time I’ve come to your country to visit this past year I’ve stayed with you, been fed by you. Sleeping, naturally, next to you. What she doesn’t know is this: if you have enough guestrooms, and enough beds, why then do we keep sleeping on the same bed? If, then, if I live abroad, why then do I visit every other week, sometimes several times a week? Why then do we keep going away together, this year to Thailand twice, once to a small East Malaysian village, Indonesia, London and Spain? She hates asking what she asked this morning: “Last month I walked in on you and saw the both of you in a deep embrace, holding each other to sleep.”
In that moment you almost spilled the truth, but like me last month (unable to tell my own father this): no words could leave your mouth.
If I ever have the chance at some time in the future when I find the courage to I would say to your mother: “Aunty, your daughter is my one and only, she is my future and she is my world. She is the one precious gem I’ve found in the short span of twenty two years in which I’ve been looking, that I’ve had the fortune to find. Your consent won’t change our love; but your blessing will change everything.”
I will say to your mother the bible says love is patient, love is kind, it does not envy, it does not boast, it is not proud. I will say to you mother our love is patient and it is kind. It neither envies, nor boasts nor is it full of pride.I will say to your mother : if I have to wait a year, two , three, four or ten to say this I will. I have time and I can wait; I will say to her I love your daughter and I will for the rest of my life.
“Let us.”
