it is 25 nov, 2014. it is your 60th birthday today. 生日快乐，爸爸
once, you were the English expert in my eyes, when i was a little kid, finding English really hard to master. one day, i just silently, unknowingly went pass you. you now said, you wrote in English, is that really for me? Very hard to understand leh.
once, you were violent, very violent. and the scar, unfortunately but also very realistically, logically, understandably, stays in everyone's heart. Tears still well up my eyes whenever someone in the family mentions or i mention the violent episodes happened. observing this, has taught me everyone, EVERYONE is not perfect. but you have changed to be so much better, so gentle, open, and being able to enjoy every moment now. you have changed from how you used to be to how you are now. it has taught me even more, compared to let's say you were perfect all the way.
i love you.
i struggled to said these three words to you towards my late teenage years. i remembered a teacher in school said that to the whole class, there would be one day you regretted not saying it when you could no longer say it in person to your parents, face to face. i struggled. but i did say it. i remembered the silence after i stood on the one side of the gate, saying "good bye, dad, i love you". you were on the other side. what were you thinking and feeling at that moment? do you remember, baba?
and i am so glad that, at 60, you are still growing, day by day, week by week, month by month. and i still feel inspired being with you. your thinking, sometimes more modern and open minded than mine. you still watch tv with full attention till you are lost in the show, and never notice we talk bad about you right beside you. i love it. i love you.
and all the time i know you, you have been together with mum. i think, it is your 30 th anniversary this year, isn't it? thanks for being such a good partner for mum, most of the time. you apologised when you were wrong. you adore her so much since you have the capacity to share with a heart full of love. you hold her hand sometimes now. and you two walked tgt, shoulder to shoulder, when life was not easy. the sadness of losing someone. the worry of close to lose a kid who had derailed. having you and mum in my life, i guess, has so quietly consistently planted some seeds in my life. it will helps me throughout my life whatever happened.
thanks, dad. you saved my life.
if you are not aware. like i said, your wrong doings left scar on others. so did mine. i am sure i have hurt you so much with what i did too. once, i was so messed up that i thought life was all too much, too overwhelming, and ending it could be the easy way out. did i tell you that? or i didn't?
and you said to me, hang on there. it will all be over. and life gets better if you hang on there.
thanks. otherwise. i wouldn't have hung on. i wouldn't be married. i wouldn't be writing today.
thank you. dad. 谢谢，爸爸
how about looking forward?
i am so obsessed with the number 3. i imagine a 90 years of life can be divided into three parts: 1-30, 31-60, 61-90. according to my segmentation, you are moving into the third and also the last 30 years of your life. Sounds too long or too short?
my 60 year old friend met in Australia, she is such an inspiration to me too. and her friends as well. at the close-retirement or retirement age, it seems like they still have things they want to learn. they are still very busy with what ''finally'' have time to do. how about your own future, dear dad?
i will be happy for you whatever you choose to do, wherever you choose to live, however you want to do it. because i am sure, if you move forward, so will i when i turn your age some day. it will be so good for everyone in your life if you are good to yourself, follow your own heart.
thanks for bringing music and other art forms into our lives. thanks for being a man with enormous patience, and persistence. thanks for changing and not changing and just simply learning and becoming a better self. thanks for being so naively positive and supportive and carefree and such a dreamer who keep asking us to be somebody. why not open your own radio station you once said to me. thanks for being grateful and loving to mum. thanks for living so humbly yet also contentedly. thanks for driving the whole family around west peninsular of malaysia in your van, that would always be such a perfect trip in my heart.
i wish you a even better 30 or more years ahead. you live like a book, you said to me. and i wish to read you like a book continuously my entire life. you are a great man, dad. look at what you have done to us, mum, your friends, your family, yourself. i love you. happy birthday.
