Sunday, April 06, 2008
Temple
While the debate in the previous post's 'comments' section rages on, I went to visit the temple my mum's urn is placed to pay my respects to her.
It has been a long time since I've went there, and to look at my mum's picture on the urn.
Well, I can't describe the exact feeling as I was there, but overwhelmingly there was a feeling of nostlagia. The days when my dad, my brother and I will go there quite regularly, and the temple seemed like quite a big place.
When I entered the temple, everything seems familiar, except that everything seemed to have 'shrank'. When you grow up, the places you used to go will suddenly take on a new dimension, becoming smaller.
When I entered that section of the temple where my mum's urn was, the feeling became sombre all of a sudden. The memories just came flooding back, and again, I felt like that little boy.
But my body was big, and I assume different responsiblities now. Everything has changed. 奶奶 has passed away. Hence, the paternal side is not as closed as it used to be. Our generation of cousins do not keep in contact at all. My brother and my father is not on talking terms anymore. My brother is married yet my father has yet to know. I'm the only link from the family to my father. Due to my improved financial situation, dad borrows money from me to settle his bills, often without returning. I can't bear to force him to return the money, which is amounting to $1000. But I'm not so rich myself. The house loan is accumulating, and waiting for my graduation to start paying it off. - 2 long more years to go still. I need to teach tuition to sustain myself. When I graduate, I need to give money to auntie, pay off my student loan, pay off the housing loan from my CPF. How to save money like that?
And the worst news from the afternoon is that I saw a big tin with a notice asking for donations, for a Royal Cremation in Thailand. When I saw the picture, I got a shock. He is the monk whom we use to visit, and he died on 24/01/08. The cremation will only take place in 2009, to be decided by the Thai King. Father was visibly upset and saddened by it. The feeling of everyone around us just dying and dying off, or splitting away from one another as we talked. Laogu's moved to Australia. Uncles and aunties seldom meet. The close days were over.
Maybe this dysfunctional part of my family, so quite different from the usual 'nuclear' + quite close extended family has brought me up in a different way. My personality makes me a free spirit, loving fun and loving jokes. Yet at the same time, the helplessness of the past plus the burden of responsibilities thrown upon me made me somehow overly serious, overly focused on achievement, and sometimes on the edge of being weird and aloof.
But who can understand all these? Hopefully, some day, someone will come along, and together we can create my debut into a more 'normal' family life.
Haha dunno what's the point of this post. Just ranting.
lowtide blogged @
11:19 pm
