I remember flying from KL to Sydney over 20 years ago. I was leaving Theresa for an indefinite period and that made for a very unpleasant flight. No flight has been anywhere near as difficult since, except the one which took us to my father’s final send off, on the morning of 1 Dec 2006. I tried to take my mind off what awaited us in Klang, Malaysia, by trying to watch the movies. Unfortunately, my movie choice only aggravated the situation. I watched a Singaporean film titled “Singapore Dreaming”. It was the story of a middle aged legal clerk of a largeish Singaporean law firm. He was conscious of his wealth (lack thereof) and social status and was counting on his son, on whom he had spent a fortune by sending him to America for a university education. He also had a daughter, who was smarter and worked harder than the son but had the misfortune to grow up in a traditional patriarchical family who always (no matter how unfairly) favours the son. The bum of a son got his break, not her, the smarter, hard-working sister. The protagonist’ constant dream was to win the local lottery and buy his way out of the filthy lifts which take him to and from his housing commission apartment. He finally hit it, and won the grand prize of 2 million dollars. The fragile family predictably comes apart, and while he inspects the grounds of an exclusive country club he was applying to join with his new found wealth, he suffred a heart attack and died on the parking lot. At this point I wanted to turn off the movie but I didnt.

The protagonist in the movie was too close to my dad in a number of ways.

I looked at my watch a few times after the movie and decided that I needed to watch another movie to off-set the effects of that Singapore flick. I had always drifted in and out of “The American Beauty”, having never finished watching it. I also never found out the ending. I thought it should be very different from the “Singapore Dreamin” so I turned it on. Of course, it turns out to be another mistake, as the protagonist (played by Kevin Spacey) was shot and killed just as he was discovering inner peace and started living in a way which satisfied him.

Each of the main characters in the two films died, just as they achieved their dreams and thought they had made it. I wished I had watched the crap that was titled “Miami Vice” instead.

As we descended near Singapore, I found myself sobbing uncontrollably. Theresa, seated 2 seats away next to Kiddo and still groggy from the anti air-sickness medication she had taken, tried to calm me down but all I could think of was how I last spoke to my father in person more than 2 years ago and I was never to be able to do that again.

We arrived at Singapore a little after 3.30 pm, took the connecting flight just before 5pm, and by the time we left luggage carousel, it was close to 6pm. Theresa’s brother and his 3 year old daughter (Megan) were waiting for us at the arrival lounge.

The massive traffic jam on the way home gave me plenty of time to think some more about the whole scenario and I simply had no idea how I was going to manage it. When we arrived at my parents’ home, I saw David my brother outside the house and he immediately put his arms around me. I found it extremely difficult to see my dad lying in state and took a few minutes to walk into the house. I remember standing next to the casket and just not believing my father was lying in it, never to speak or listen to me anymore. I dont remember ever crying that much in my life. We had arrived at the house a little before 8pm and the wake service was to start at 8.30pm. I sat on the front row between my mother and Theresa and found the whole service disruptive to my desires to recall my father’s life. But then the pastor spoke about how he had visited my father about 10 days or so before, and found my father to be a peace with God and himself. David and Jean (his wife) were to repeatedly reinforce this with me. While this was very comforting, it wasnt what pained me. I had always been sure of his salvation and prayed only for his relationship with God to be closer each day. What pained me was the unbearable realisation that I was never to hear him, speak to him, or simply look at him going about any sort of activities, ever again. I had so much more to say to him. I wanted to listen to him some more. I dont think I heard him enough. I hope nothing would ever come in the way of relationships with people who mean something to me, ever again, no matter how difficult or how painful the process of keeping that relationship open and alive, prove to be.

Yesterday afternoon, I took kiddo and a niece (Nicole, my sister Siok Sim’s daughter) nephew (Isaac, Nicole’s brother) to lunch in a coffee shop in Taman Chi Liung, a housing estate next to that where my parents’ home was. My father went there for breakfast every morning, pedalling on this bicycle. Sitting at a table next to us was a man who looked about the same age as my father. He even looked a little like him. As I looked outside the coffee shop, I saw another old man pedalling on a bicycle. The two scenes did it for me and I went off again. Drying my tears, I explained to kiddo and Nicole what just struck me. I dont know how long this is going to take. When I would stop recollecting my father’s life or let it break me down. Last night a few uncles, and their families, David and Siok Sim, kiddo, all went for a drink at the local Indian-Muslim stall (“Mamak Stall”) and Jean came up and recalled some of Dad’s last days. It broke me down again. Would it stop soon?