The One Who Feeds the Sparrow
Hi.. just in case you are wondering who this cute little boy is, its none other than yours truly.See that spinky brownish hair? Well, fortunately hair did eventually grown and turn black. See that squinty small eyes? Well, I still have them... still working on trying to make them bigger everyday (though in vain). See that cute bunny teeth? Well, they eventually fell out and the front teeth I have now are new ones... See that goofy smile? Well, I think (and seriously hope i'm correct) that its gone by now.... See that shirt? Gone obviously.....
So thats me, when I was... I duno... 2 or 3? Something like that. What do you think? Cute? People asked me a lot why my hair was brown and not black back then.
I used to be my mommy's boy. Everyone would say I looked like her..... She would keep on telling me I will grow up to be a handsome boy, and that in the future many girls would come after me; 2 predictions I'm still waiting to come true (hahaha.. )
Do you believe in God? Sometimes, when life gets so challenging and difficult, its hard to believe there really is someone up there watching over you and caring for you. At times when you are feeling down, and there just seems to be no way out to the problem, you wonder what He is doing up there. Most of the times, we do what we feel is right, based on our own reasoning and logic. Which isnt really that bad, when you think about it. Whats wrong with acting based on your own sound judgement right? Whats wrong in toughening yourself, believing in yourself and trusting that what you do will bear fruit because you have a mind for it?
Only thing is, look at that picture. Who created that cute little me? How did my mother do this amazing and miraculous feat of giving birth to an entirely new life being? Yes, its biology 101, but who created it? Is life and the creation of new life a purely coincidental thing? Or does it just happen? How many would answer yes? I think deep down, we all have a built in intrinsic belief that there is a God. We acknowledge that our life itself is not a creation of chance, but by deliberate design.... If you have children, look at your children, if you have siblings look at them, isn't it amazing? We all would freely say that child birth is an accepted miracle. We acknowledge it as something extraordinary and miraculous. We know it is a gift, a gift of life. We give high honour and respect to the mother who bears the pain and delivers the child, but we thank and attribute it as a gift from someone, and that someone is God.
We acknowledge that it is by act of God that life is brought into this world. But sometimes, we fail to bring that into our own lives, to acknowledge that he not only brings life into this world, but also sustains it. Seldom do we look to God for guidance and strength. Only when things go beyond our own strength do we suddenly think about God again and ask for some help. Worst, of all, even in asking for help from God, we tend to ask for what we want to come true, in other words, that our will be done. We seldom, if ever stop to ask what perhaps God wants for us; which is unsurprising, since to many, God is not a feasible or ever present entity, but some belief in some vague higher power that is supposed to be there, but never really there.
Do you believe in God? I do. I come to realise that nothing I have done, nothing I have achieved, nothing of who I am is because of my own self. People praise me for the strength to continue with my family crisis, but I asked myself when did I ever have such strength? People tell me I am smart and well spoken, but since when was I ever such things? The truth is, I am none of it. I do not feel proud of all the pain, sufferings and achievements alike. On the contrary, I feel humbled, that I someone managed, not by my own will and strength but through support from God. He didnt send a saviour to me to rescue me from financial burdens or things like that; but at times when things are down, your heart feels black and there's no way out, you find yourself having the strength to go one, despite everything... thats when you know God is working on you.. from within.
My heart is disturbed by these recent news and events on my mother.... but when i looked at this picture, i remember that through no small feat my mother gave birth to me. As frail a woman as she is, she made this miracle in me. The one that saw her through my birth, will see me through my ordeal, and see her through hers. It is our duty to do all that we can, to do what we know should be done.... but what man can plan, only God can see through. Man can brave their hearts and take the leap, but it is God who delivers.... in Him I will trust, because if I did myself, all hope would be lost. A friend wrote this for me to spur me on:
I don't know what may come tomorrow,
It may bring me poverty,
But the one who feeds the sparrow,
Is the one who stands by me.
Real Life Nightmares....
What would be the right thing to do if you knew your mother was out on the streets?
What would you do if you get a call from someone telling you of rumours that your mother has been roaming around town looking all ragged and dirty?
That is exactly the question I face now. Should we try to go down and get her? How? Where do we find her? How do we even know where to begin? We do know she is in town, but the town is not that small, and just driving around hoping to stumble upon her does not seem a good idea.
A visiting friend from overseas asked me the other day how my mother was. I was caught off guard. Usually, no one asks me questions like this. Maybe its because I hardly bring the matter up, maybe its because people think I dont like talking about. Maybe I dont bring it up because I dont like talking about it...How was I to answer? This was a visiting friend, and the question was one of casual concern, not a heart to heart session. I decided to go for the truth.
I told her my mom is not doing too well. She has been living on her own, God knows where and how, but only that she is up north in my home town. She has been refusing medication, and is now entirely on her own, taking medication at her own will. She gives my brother and I a call once in a while to ask how we are, but we get little chance of talking to her since the conversations never last more than a minute. Then one day my aunt calls; her own sister. She tells us that people have been telling her her sister has been walking around town talking to herself, looking dirty and homeless, fighting people and refusing any help offered. Why she calls now and not sooner beats me. It seems to me she calls because she is concerned about keeping face. She called not to ask what we can do to solve this together, but that my brother and I quickly take action on the matter. Some family we have there.
It breaks the heart. What are you to do anyway? Despite talking repeatedly over the phone, we failed to come to a clear answer. I told my friend honestly that we have tried whatever means we thought would be best for her; we tried letting her stay on her own, but she went into terrible relapses and almost died; we tried staying with her thinking our presence would somehow help, she ended up running away, calling us her abusers; we tried sending her to a Shelter home; but it drove us broke and she accused us of locking her up in jail. What more can we do? For the past 2 yeas she has run away no less than 6 times. She fights with everyone and anyone who gets close to her and tries to help her, including her own two sons. She starts calling my friends, telling them not to allow me to be baptised; a bizarre thing to do since she herself is a baptised Christian. She refuses to stay in the house when visiting and instead decided to stay in the park for two nights, resulting in her bags being stolen.
I was being honest, perhaps too much so with my friend, who seemed instantly lost for words, struggling to find some comforting words for me. But its OK, I have never been the type to hope for sympathy from others. But I appreciated the concern none the less.
Ever since starting work, I have been so immersed and wrapped around it that I have had time for little else. Gone were the days where I could sit behind the computer for hours while some blog is brewing in my mind. I hardly have time for myself. Whats worse, I hardly have time for my mother anymore. What is stopping me from driving up north and trying to help my mother? My job and my commitment towards it.
i dont know if I am lying to myself in thinking that driving up would not make much difference. Even if I do drive up and meet her, what am I to do? What is the right thing to do? Admit her? How? Create a scene, strap her down, tie her up and drag her to the mental hospital like some deraged mental case? Can you call that her right thing to do? Or do we continue to respect her free will and action and allow her to do as she pleases? In respecting her actions and will, we preserve her dignity and respect, but at what cause? Would that be there 'righter' thing to do?
Just a few days ago, I had a nightmare of sorts; I dreamt that I received a phone call when I am work, on the line is my brother, telling me that he just received news that my mother had just passed away. Here's the unimaginable thing; I practically willed myself to wake up from that dream. Somehow, the dream stopped there, as if even in my dreams I am not prepared to face such a day yet. The intense feeling of guilt, anger, sadness and loss would probably be too much for me. I keep telling myself not to let that day come. I keep telling myself I have to take charge to make sure my mother remains safe... but what should I do? How?.......
I feel like my 5 year old self again, having the same old dream of loosing my parents again... only this time, mom and dad aren't next door for me to cry to anymore............
Trip to Penang Part 2
Famous Char Koay teow?
Every Chinese makan shop you go to will surely have one hawker selling on item: char koay teow a.k.a fried kpay teow or fried flat noodles if you are totally alien to malaysian food. But they dont just give it any name like Ah Chongs fried koay teow or Boons Best Fried..etc... it can and only has one name... Penang Char Koay teow. Not Melaka, not Johor, not Perak, not Selangor, and not even Kedah.... for some reason, if its char koay teow, it has to be from Penang, or so they would tell you.
So what is a person to do for the first dinner he is to have while in Penang? The answer came almost by itself. Of course we all know Penang is supposed to be famous for its good food, so good so much that all local hawkers in the entire peninsular Malaysia feels obliged to put the word Penang in front of they char koay teow and Asam Laksa. So it seemed almost a sin not to at least try our hands on some koay teow that literally came from Penang. Where is the most famous place to eat in all of Penang.. Gurney Drive of course... named after the former Governer of Penang Sir Henry Gurney (I think ;p) I will confess, I had high expectations. After meeting countless Penang-nites who swear that the char koay teows in KL were all unworthy imitations of the real deal up north, I was eager to be impressed. Remember I had this theory that the old looking shop with the old looking man would often sell the best food? Well, there were no old looking hawkers stalls in Gurney drive. They were all very clean and up to date. for the benefit of tourist no doubt. But I did manage to find one particular char koay teow shop were there seemed to be a long line. And when you see people willing to line up for food, you know it must be good. That plus the man doing the frying looked reasonably old to me. So what the heck, I joined the line and awaited my turn.
Along the way we bought some fried meats, fried oysters etc etc etc.. it was turning out more and more like this was more an eating holiday than sight seeing holiday!
So how was this famous this dish that would probably have been our national dish if it were not made with pork oil? Well............ again disappointment, disappointment, and disappointment. As old has he was, the old cook dispelled my theory on age with the deliciousness of food. The rest of the night, we were too tired to do anything else, so we just walked around Gurney Plaza and went home to the hotel for some snoozing!
Back to the Photos
The next morning, we headed for the botanical gardens. Now, despite being called a botanical garden, the place really is notorious for something else; monkeys to be specific. The last time I was 3 feet tall and was 8 years old, visited this place, and was forever left with the image of a ferocious monkey stealing a poor girls potato chips. But still it remains a beautiful and green place, kind a kind a green lung for Penang Island.
The monkeys here are fearless of humans, and would attack and try to take whatever food you have on you. Needless to say, we were careful not to bring any food. I just hoped that the monkeys havent learnt how to use a digital camera, else even that would be stolen. Proof of the notoriety of these monkeys? Take a look at this sign.
Like I said... its always the company that make the trip special......
You know you can always have good fun and monkey around without making a fool of yourself.............
When you are with buddies you trust, and are comfortable with.......
Plus, they patiently wait for you until you get that shot just right!
I guess the highlight of the trip would always be going up Bukit Bendera. It took us 2 trams and 40 minutes to reach the top.. but I tell you, the view from the top was work all the waiting and cramming with tens of other people, some with hands smelling like dhall after just coming straight from the various famous Nasi Kandar shops around Penang. From the top you get to see a birds eye view of the city and the surrounding islands, and it was then and there that I decided coming for this holiday was not a mistake after all. We all need a break sometimes, and being nothing beats being among the mountains with the cool breeze blowing at you, beautiful sunny sky above and blue ocean stretching all the way as far as the horizon.... gosh, I need another holiday! Anyway, here's the rest of the trip in pictures.. if I tried typing more, it take me another silly week just to finish this post!
Trips like this always make me wonder about my friends... The more good times you spend, the more you realise good friends are hard to find... and even harder to find those you are comfortable being with.... It really is sad that friends come and go.. why is it that we can never have all the people we love and care for around us together at one time? Its always bits and pieces here and there..... But I guess you take what you get and embrace the moments that do come.. for all that it was worth, as short as it was, always remember to savour the times spent together.. you never know when the next time will be or if it comes at all..... If you can do that, then you will have no regrets in the future.
Trip to Penang Part 1
For some reason, holidays in Malaysia invariably turn into some sort of gastronomical quest of searching for the best foods in town, and my trip to Penang was no different.
So after even though I had been driving for 5 hours straight and it was 5 o clock in the morning, my friends felt no guilt whatsoever in asking me "Where are we going for breakfast?"
Naturally, I had to oblige, and so we went on a morning breakfast hunt, looking for some crazy hawker who would think of selling char koey teow at 5 a.m. We did not manage to find any, but we did come across this rather famous mamak that sold banana ice cream pancake with chocolate and honey (or something like that). But fearing a premature heart attack (with such a potent combination of fats and sugar) and also what it would do to our stomachs, we moved on. We settled on eating mee suah right by the sea side on Gurney drive. Of course, that was after we got repeated lost trying to drive around the islands. Not bad for our first morning eh? Anyway, we checked into the hotel, and out of sheer pity we all agreed that we would only start out on our Penang adventure after I had some sleep. After all, I did drive the entire night all alone with no one to talk to while these bunch of ever supportive friends tested out my car pillows, leather seats and comfort levels of my car.
This lovely picture up here that you, see.. Thats not mee suah. That is a bowl of Penang Asam Laksa (Balik Pulau to be exact) that I drove half the island length just to eat. It supposed to be the trademark of this small charming pekan. At least that was what it said on the internet. Balik Pulau isnt really a island at all as its name might imply. It turns out Balik Pulau really meant Sebalik Pulau, or the other/back side of the island. So we drove around the island, taking long treacherous roads all in the name of tasting this supposedly famous delicacy. Now, my friend and I have had this theory for quite some time now. After enough, we believe that most of the foods you see which look deliciously presentable and fully garnished and sold by slightly younger people are not as good. You have to look for the old man with the small stall right at the corner preparing his food quietly, with minimum decos, and minimum garnish to the food; they are the ones
with the best food, because for some reason, the older generation sold more based on the quality of taste rather than its presentation. So with that in mind, we went to the oldest looking store with the oldest looking uncle making the food and ordered 4 bowls of Penang Asam laksa. The Laksa turned out to be ok, but was a bit too sweet for our KL taste buds. I supposed Asam laksa will always taste like Asam laksa no matter where you go, and perhaps we had our hopes too high up expecting at any moment to be brought to tears at first bite.Of course, that's not all we ordered. Koey Teow soup and tau Foo Far that everyone else seemed to be ordering was on top of our list, and I must say, having zero expectations of it, we were more impressed by them than we were of the Asam Laksa.
Anyway, the nice thing about driving to the middle of nowhere is that you get to see a lot of greenery. It was also here that I finally remember to actually take a picture of my car! Its not a full shot of the car, but hey, if you have seen one Proton Wira, you have seen a thousand of them. This one is actually looking down on Balik Pulau from up the mountains after we finished eating and took a grand total of 5 minutes to see the entire town center. Suddenly I was glad that I remembered to wash the car before embarking! The trip was just the four of us; my girlfriend and I, my buddy whom I went to London and Paris with, and another friend of us, who was really the object of desire of my buddy. So while this was purely a holiday for my girlfriend and I, it was really a time of opportunity for my friend to get to know this lovely lady that we were nice enough to introduce to him!
There was also a part of this trip that I actually dread coming to but secretly was looking forward to it, which was the Snake temple. Now when you say its a Snake Temple, what comes to your mind? To me it was a temple filled, I mean filled with snakes everywhere you go, every step you take every corner you walk. I was even joking in the car that I hope there is no snakes in the toilet! Now here's something you may not know about me. I am terrified of snakes. More generally, I am terrified of all reptiles. There is just something about these cold blooded creatures that just makes me nervous in every inch of my body. But as with everything that we are terrified of, we somehow become mystically enthralled by them. Despite all my fears of snakes and reptiles, despite never before (and ever) held a snake or any reptile in my hand, I have watched more reptile documentaries than all my friends combine. I confess myself absolutely fascinated by them, but at the same time completely and utterly terrified of them. Can you imagine how I anticipated going to the Snake temple. But alas, it was not as I hoped/feared it to be.
The temple was really in honour of some Buddhist Monk who set up this temple and sheltered the snakes from around that seemed to know that Monks are vegetarian. There were no snakes on the loose, despite what the signboards said. This picture is of the alter for the temple, and that Idol you see is in fact the monk I said. To make things worse, the place was really really small, and it took us just another grand 5 minutes to see the entire temple. The fact that the temple was smack in the middle of a free trade industrial area. The temple sat right among miles and miles of electronic and electrical companies and large corporations. I forgot that Penang was a free trade zone and that companies like Intel, Dell and a host of corporations set up their South East Asia hub here. So much for mystic and wonder for the snake temple!
But to be fair, we did eventually find a significant amount of snakes, but they were all behind cages and glasses, which again I was both happy and secretly disappointed with. For all my fears of reptiles, I actually psyched myself into being ready to be scared out of my pants by these limb lacking leeches.... The local temple guide did a good job of explaining the various snakes to us, and this King Cobra was bothered from its slumber by the guide just for our benefit. I did learn that they detect you through you body heat and smell. That explained why the snake did not reach when the guide poked it with a metal stick but immediately erected to striking position when he sense a leg or body coming near. It was one thing to see in in a documentary, and totally another to see it proven in front of my eyes!
Going to KOMTAR again was a complete disappointment. When I was about 5 or 6 years old, my mother would bring me to Penang once in a while to visit my grandmother. We would travel to Komtar and take the bus from there to where she lived. Along the way, we would always go walking around the shopping center in Komtar. that was easily 15 years ago. Komtar was and remains a landmark in Penang. It is the tallest building you will see when you arrive at Georgetown. It used to be a gem of a place, literally a towering figure of Penang. But when I got there, it was not what it used to be.
The place was old, filthy, run downed with an unbearable stench. There were homeless people lying down on the floors, and it seemed more like a place for foreign workers of the likes of Indonesians, Thais, Nepalese would hang out. If there was once place closest in resemblance to it would be Kota Raya in KL. But even Kota Raya has now been closed down last year. There was a plaque place outside not far from where I took this picture, of Tun Dr. Mahatir signing the official launching of this place back in 1990. How did a place go down the dumps in such a short spam of 17 years? We left barely an hour after coming here. I had hope to show my friends this wonderful place that was part of my childhood, but I went away more disappointed than any of them.
To be continued....
