GrandPa & GrandMa

I'm suddenly thinking of my maternal grandparents while lazying on the bed. I was not extremely close to grandpa&ma, but they were my only "oldest" people in the family. Well, not really. I had a errrmmm....step-paternal-grandma who lived in Singapore, but we seldom get together. It was most probably once in a year. And the fondest memories I have with my granny were her *yummy* chicken stew...she loved Guinness and she never gets drunk...and she speaks in a funny accent.

Now, let's get back to my maternal grandpa&ma....they are much more closer to me in the heart. But not so close that they would hug me or play with me when I was a kid. They are just like SuperMom, very traditional and shy sometimes.

Mom would bring me to Gombak every Saturday morning when I was a kid. Dad will either fetch us there, or we would enjoy a Mini Bus ride from Central Market and take Bus No. 11 all the way to Gombak. A small, wooden kampung house where my grandpa&ma resided.

Mom would enjoy her best Kopi-O with grandma while chatting away, while grandpa would puff his favorite "curut" at the living room. Grandpa loved his Teh-O Kau...he drinks it everyday without fail. Then later in the evening, Mom Grandma and sometimes Bro will play Rummy...while I naughty around the house. Or grandpa will bring me out to the Chinese Ah-Pek Medicine Shop and buy my top fav Golden Grass Kia-Moy...金草酸莓...I can't find this snack anymore nowadays, grandpa...

The lesson I learned from Grandpa:
It was nearing August. As the country marks the patriotic month, there will be lots of planes, helicopters, what-so-ever making their routine training to prepare for the celebration day. One hot afternoon, I was sitting at the living room with Grandpa, when a roaming sound of planes (or jets?) zoomed over the sky. Grandpa quickly covered his ears with both hands, and gave me an irritated but worried expression. I told grandpa "Kung...nothing la, those malay p*gs (my ah-kung hates malays) are just training and preparing for merdeka maa....." and then my grandpa said "you know, last time during the war, it sounded exactly like this one too"....And then there was just silence....I was dumb-founded. I didn't know what else to say, because I knew he had seen so much more than me. I would never feel what he had really gone through....


GrandPa. I never had a chance to take a picture with Grandma...

This scene flashed through my mind a moment ago. It makes me wonder...there are certain memories in life that we can never opt to forget. Should there be so many chapters in life, grandpa would never forget those days when war was just under his nose. He could remember some scenes, some noises...some smell....so real as if it's happening again.

The mind is much greater than any processor, or memory disk, or what-da'hell IT advancement human is creating now. Only the human mind contain such ability to remember; and when it strikes you, it feels just like yesterday.

Me too, are haunted by certain memories in life. There are those happy moments, which I'm afraid to recall because knowing happiness makes the unhappy one(s) seemingly more painful than it is. And those bad encounters, as I said, could be so real when retrieved from my memories...it hurts just the same way it was.

I don't know if I would choose to erase all of them should I have the ability to do so. But if I forget, will you still remember me?