---------------------------------------- I've been to Shanghai before...But it was a whizzy shorter-than-2-days stopover on the tail end of a month plus school trip. This time round, I will be living with Guan, my cousin. He works for an American MNC and lives with his family in the Pudong expat community, so I guess I will have a more interesting perspective of this place many plug as the "New York of Asia."
If you scrutinize the cover of "Lonely Planet - Shanghai," you will see the word "HUO" which means "commodity, product, goods" in Chinese. The same pronunciation of Huo however, also means "disaster" in Mandarin...
my dad dragged my mum out of bed the following Sunday mornin (after barely 4 hrs) to go to the neighborhood park to accompany him on his usual rounds of Tai Ji classes.
And i took his cue from there:
I got up, prepared my notes, and conducted a 4+ hr meetin with my uncle through to Sunday afternoon. We discussed our pitch for H company's website revamp. Then I worked thru the night (after goin over to my cousin's place for the wake and staying past midnight) to get the proposal out.
My uncle and I were convinced H would look for a larger vendor to conduct its website revamp. But i wanted to put up the best fight i could; I wanted to prove that despite being a young and small setup, we had the capability to handle this particular project.
The unexpected illnesses, deaths, tragedies.... It felt like Life was taunting me.
------------------------------------------ Wed 4th Oct 2006, 3+ pm
H company called back, and made some queries with regards to the price packages and ideas we had submitted in our proposal. ------------------------------------------
After the phone-call, I shot out of my seat and punched the air.
It's not a big deal.
It was just a phone-call.
But the proposal n ideas (which I conceptualized with my uncle! Our hardwork!!) piqued enough interest to warrant one phone-call! from this listed company!
They didn't say "Small unknown company. Pointless concepts. Delete!" -------------------------------------------------
For a fleeting moment... last Sunday morning... I thought about declining to pitch. "Forget it. Screw it...What's the point?"
Being surrounded by unexpected tragedies... ur fortitude starts to waver. u start to wonder what's worthwhile...
But what else should I have been doing on Sunday? Sit and stare into space? And Wallow?
----------------------------------------------------------------------- Oct 5th 2006. My aunt-in-law's body was cremated today, and behind my sunglasses, I cried...and cried, as I remembered her warmth, her great culinary skills...and the bright and cheery family gatherings with her and grandma and my uncles and aunts, and our cousins.
The most heartwrenching part was when I recollected the expressions on my cousins' face at the mortuary that night, as they kissed their mum for the last time. ------------------------------------------------------------------------ Oct 5th 2006. 5.36pm My brother Yang and I stayed back to spend some time with my cousins and uncle after the final proceedings of the Chinese funeral.
Grandma was also around. She reminded us to drink the green-bean soup she had made. ------------------------------------------------------------------------- 6th Oct, 2.53am
At the end of the day, what was the H company pitch about?
I remember the conversation I had with my youngest brother Yu during our van journey back from the mortuary that Saturday night.
Me "You know what? Dad will still go teach Tai Ji tomorrow morning."
Yu "Ya, he will go there and PWN everyone in the sparring sessions man..." -------------------------------------------------------------------------
Dad and Mum at their birthday dinner earlier this year in April check out the matching yellow outfits... : D
----------------------------------------------------- p.s. mum was so worn out from this past week helping out over at my cousins' place, she came home after the funeral and gave her barely 10 months' old handphone a good spin in the washing machine along with her own clothes. When i came home and heard about it from dad, the three of us shared a good laugh. Then I walked over to mum, and hugged her tight.
I entered a mortuary for the first time in my life today, to pay respects to my aunt-in-law, who had just passed away from a fatal car accident.
The blood around her ears, forehead, and hair were still bright red. The medical tube you see doctors shove down their patients' throats in movies, and on TV, in urgent attempts of resuscitation, was still there,
right there.
"The tube is still in her mouth!" That was the first thought that came into my mind when I saw my aunt-in-law in the mortuary.
I had assumed the medical staff would clean and tidy the deceased patient before letting family members in.
But that's not the way reality works.
I stood there in shock, with my two brothers.
We exited the mortuary deep in our own thoughts, silent...holding back tears, .
....all monsters and dust, with everything priced above its proper value. I think you will tire first, all the same."
--- Lord Henry, "The Picture of Dorian Gray", Oscar Wilde
