It has been decades since he passed away. He left us for too long, way back when I was an innocent little girl who pretty much thought of the world as a simple as she was. Even the death of a parent was not too impactful at that time. I remember seeing my mother's deep pain, being left with nine children. The tears, the sorrow, the spoken and unspoken sadness as the world collapsed upon us. Months and years of worries on how to pay for school, food, and the roof.
Ignorance was a bliss for a young girl like me back then, for if I knew what's coming ahead, I probably would crumble into pieces, not having any means to cope. I saw people, I saw relatives, I saw many of them feeling sorry for us, I heard the talk about how young my father was to have died at 48, how the death was so unexpected. Again and again. But I didn't see a great deal of assistance from them. Nothing much to be fair. We were surrounded mostly by people who financially struggled too. Those who weren't, probably stayed away. We were just too much in deep, too many to help. We were all too lost, we did not know where to go and what to do. But we united as a family.
How ironic it is for now I see that wealthy people keep on getting gifts and stuff that they do not need while for certain they could afford buying those stuff themselves while poor people barely get anything for free. Irony. Financially helpless people hang around the same kind and when they are in trouble, in most cases, their companies are either aren't willing or aren't able to help. Life is never fair since, I'd like to say here, the beginning of time. Poverty sometimes destroys people but in many it could fire up people in being the best they possibly could.
Back to my father. The truth is I hardly knew him. I can only remember bits and pieces of my interactions with him, but I can't confidently say if those are my real memories of him or the memories that I retained from being fed by my older siblings.
He was the reason of my presence in this beautiful yet complicated orb. I could not change the number of years he spent with me, with us and with the world, no matter what I do, no matter how hard I try. He left way too soon, before color tv became a norm in every household. Before computer and mobile phones become common words among most people. Before the Internet and the wifi take over the world. He left before learning that Facebook could hurt but also benefit human kind. He left without seeing how extraordinary his children and grandchildren grew up to be, how they survive pains and suffering the world and people cause and how they go through the joys and happiness in life.
I don't know him well, I don't him much, but this day, as I am sitting on the plane taking me to Shanghai from Singapore, sitting next to my best friend in this planet, I really want to take my time to remember him. Whatever he left behind, it is up to us to make something or nothing out of it.
I am grateful for the amount and for what he left. People might think that he practically left nothing much behind. But for me, the little thing he left gave me a strong drive to be better than best in every single thing I do. It could backfire at times as I am always my hardest critique and I am not forgiving of my mistakes.
But dad, rest in peace.
