Forthnights

Firstly, I apologise for the blurred pictures. There’s only so much light, and so much a digicam can do!

I know I said I’d be Santa this year, but it didn’t quite work out.

As you can see, I didn’t give it up easily and gave the new Santa a good punch! :-p. We had one final practice on Tuesday, in which I didn’t play the guitar. But it went horribly; for some reason, my friend couldn’t catch the proper tempo for the songs without me leading, plus the girls weren’t used to his lead. So in the end, we decided that I was needed more as a guitarist than Santa. Santa’s post was handed over to one of the girls who turned out to be a rather cute, cheerful and hyper Santa. As you will see from the photos, she was so fast moving; most of her pictures were all blurred. Now that’s what we call speed!

Anyway, things went typical Malaysia style, with the majority of us all arriving late, us included. It took an hour from the usual 30 minutes to arrive at the hospital due to the jam in KL. What more, just as we were ready to go to the hospital, it started to rain cats and dogs. It really seemed like lady luck wasn’t on our side when at practice, one of the guitar strings snapped. Just as we were about to start singing, my guitar string napped. Great start.

But as the evening unfolded, we forgot about it all, and just continued with the carolling. 3 years running, its still a fun thing. Unlike in the west, carolling during Christmas time isn’t really a mainstream activity. Mostly confined to the Christian communities, the only other time the general public get to see carollers are in the shopping malls. In short, carolling is more of a novelty than anything else.

Anyway, the carolling with rather smoothly after that, with people all sorts of people coming out of their rooms to look at what’s happening and singing along with us. Just like previous years, the most touching times were always in the Intensive Care Unit (ICU) where all the patients were in critical condition.

When we entered the ICU, even before we even began doing anything, the son of one particular old lady came up to us to request a song. For course, we obliged the family. You could just see how special it was for them, especially knowing that their mother was critically ill, not knowing if she would live to see another Christmas. As we sang, the son bent over and uttered to the mother, “Look ma, they are singing for you! They are singing for you!” and the mother just nodding her head in understanding. That really made the night for me… That was why I felt doing this was worth it, even if it meant a whole lot of trouble and not a cent in return.

At days end, we were all exhausted from the singing, and my fingers were hurting from all the playing. But like I said, it was the third and final time we were going to do this. This time round next, all of us would be elsewhere, most of the nurses would be graduated and working in their respective hospitals, and it would be someone else’s turn to keep up the tradition.

It is a memory I will undoubtedly cherish, as will many of the carollers and friends who have done it with me for three years running. It’s a special memory to me; one to remind me that in our times of laughter and joy, especially around Christmas, we should never forget that there are still people, fighting to stay alive at that very moment, friends praying and hoping for a miracle for their beloved, and those who lost their loved ones, just as everyone else seems to be celebrating. Let us not let our cheerful shouts of Merry Christmas drown out the silent sobs of those whose Christmas is more black than red.

In the mean time, hope you like the pics