Yesterday (May 4) I saw a young man walking most inelegantly in the Botanics Gardens.
In each of his hand was a walking aid which wobbled with each step he took. Two persons were holding to the straps attached to a girdle around his waist to keep him from falling over.
He was probably in post-surgery mode or suffering from something. His walk didn’t look easy or comfortable. But boy, could he smile!
He didn’t care who was looking at his struggle or how ungainly he looked to others. With each clumsy step he took, he was radiating joy.
One of the members in his entourage must have noticed my awestruck state and smiled warmly back at me when our eyes met.
He was a vision. I’ve rarely seen a beautiful smile like his on many intact, clean limbed & youthful bodies.
Is this what it means to rise above all circumstances?
This morning, decked in traditional finery that spoke of ethnic pride & brimming with benedictions fresh from morning prayers, First Tutee touched the back of my hand with his forehead to wish me peace.
First Tutee is now taller than me. I’ve known him before he entered Primary One.
For the past few years, my home has been his first place of visit after prayers at the mosque on Hari Raya mornings.
A little boy and his cat friend on Hari Raya morning a a few years back.
This year he brought a friend with him. He wanted to show him how to interact with Oliver the Cat.
First Tutee supervising his friend’s first contact with a cat.
First Tutee explained to his little friend how he used to be scared of cats before he met Oliver.
He then taught him how to sit still while waiting for the cat to approach, and how to offer food respectfully to the animal.
Showing his little friend how to approach a cat & feed him respectfully.
“Don’t touch him when he’s trying to eat cos it makes him nervous,” said the older boy to the younger one.
While they were sitting by the window, First Tutee pointed out the direction of Batam, Indonesia, to his fascinated guest. He also told him the body of water he saw was called a reservoire, not a swimming pool.
Two Muslim boys looking out of the window at the world while the prayer flags flutter above them.
Although First Tutee and I are not related by blood, and these days we don’t see each other much, he seems to have taken after me in the way he explains things. And now & then when he spots a full moon, he’ll send me a picture of it.
While we make material provisions for our children, showing them how to live peacefully with all despite our differences could give them the wisdom & compassion to journey further & do better under all circumstances in life.
“Unity doesn’t have to mean uniformity” – Palki Sharma, news anchor of WION.
My little Kitty Hawk loved lying under the picture of Mother Mary and Baby Jesus.
A young girl harboured a mixture of hatred and pity for a bad tempered older sibling who would hit her regularly.
At the time when we met, she was seeing a counsellor. Her family dynamics were also volatile.
As she ranted on, I realised she not only needed protection from her brother’s beatings, but also from her own fears & what she might do to him. She was an alert and well built girl whom I believed would have no problem picking up a sharp object and plunging it into her attacker if she was provoked beyond her tolerance.
After learning that she could recite the “Hail Mary,” prayer by heart, I asked if she would consider invoking Mother Mary’s help as soon as she sensed a conflict brewing.
I explained to her that some things in life are beyond logic, and there is a limit to what external intervention can do for us. Prayers are needed to do the inner work of calming hearts and deflecting blows.
Shortly after that, the girl told me that one weekend her older sibling was having a meltdown again.
This time instead of feeling scared and anticipating a fight as he moved towards her, she just looked at him and recited “Hail Mary” silently.
“My brother was walking towards me when he suddenly stopped, turned and left my room ,” the girl narrated the episode with a mixture of awe & gratitude.
Sister & brother would also begin talking after that encounter.
To some, the girl’s offering of a prayer to diffuse a potentially explosive situation could have been coincidental, but the benefit of knowing that there are other ways of facing difficulties in life besides hating those who cause us pain, must have been such a relief for that young lady.
Yesterday was Palm Sunday and in a few days’ time it’ll be Good Friday. On this day the mother of Jesus would witness attacks on her son. This may be why the memory of a young girl invoking the help of Mother Mary has come to me, for they are quintessential examples of grace under pressure.
May all who suffer from war, sickness & separation be delivered from fears & pain. And may all who engage in hurt & harm be touched by grace & awakened by wisdom.🙏
May the Divine Mother come into our midst to comfort us during wars, sickness & separation. ❤️
Yesterday I completed a recommendation letter for a young girl applying for a summer programme in one of the Ivy League universities. Given her impressive academic credentials & balanced disposition , I think she’ll be accepted regardless of what I wrote.
Nonetheless, when I recalled the limited options available to girls & women of my grandmother’s generation, I wrote that letter with extra care & gratitude for this young girl who was born a 100 years after my grandmother.
This matriarch is in her 80s. She shares the same surname as my grandmother. She’s been through war, hidden in bunkers, raised 10 children and now continues to host friends and visitors in her 400 year old ancestral home. Her well kept wedding picture taken when she was 17 is a testament of her tenderness and tenacity. (Kinmen Island 2019)
So my wish on International Women’s Day is for all female children to be raised fairly & firmly, so that they can determine the trajectory of their lives with tenderness & tenacity.
For it is easier to build a well-adjusted child, than to fix a broken adult.
This precious little girl stands proudly in her school uniform. I was once her age too. (Nepal, 2013)
First Tutee and his uncle meet Ollie for the first time in 2 years today. (2-2-2022)
First Tutee and his uncle dropped by with Nasi Lemak today to wish me Happy Chinese New Year.
First Tutee is now nearly 11 years old, as tall as me and seeing Ollie for the first time since 2020.
Pleased that Ollie still remembered him, and that the scene outside the window where he used to sit to practise his spelling and writing, had remained unchanged, he gushed shyly about spotting his childhood sweets on my dining table.
First Tutee’s childhood sweets, White Rabbit.
I asked him to help himself to the White Rabbit Milk Candy pieces. I had prepared a new bag of them for him to bring home later on.
As he unwrapped the candy, he mentioned several times that White Rabbits were his favourite childhood sweets and that he was also born in the Year of the Rabbit.
First Tutee’s delight at seeing Ollie and recalling the names of Hakim, Kitty & China Black who have since passed on, his smiling at the sweets of his childhood and feeling right at ease in a space where he started his preparation to enter primary school showed me a reunion doesn’t always have to revolve around a big meal.
First Tutee with Kitty in 2018.
Food & drinks aside, a reunion is also about returning to the people & place that make us feel supported.
Same cane chairs, different occupiers. First Tutee is now going on 11. (2-2-22)
And if reunions are meant to evoke memories to embolden us to move forward, then it is wise that during that encounter we refrain from fishing for details in someone else’s personal life unless they are offered on their own accord.
Going home for reunions is such a big deal across cultures & evokes many conflicting emotions in some. May each reunion be a time of reconciliation and mutual support like the one that took place with First Tutee today.
Getting in and out of a vehicle for me require a certain level of coordination & focus.
One day I hailed a cab along the road. When the cab driver slowed down for me, the bus driver behind us sounded the horn while I tried to get onto the cab as swiftly as possible.
In the calm cocoon of his seat, the thin & bespectacled driver with his praying mantis liked arms must have picked up my panic of not being fast enough and getting in the way of the bus.
“Miss, please take your time and get onto my cab safely,” the cab driver alerted me authoritatively even as the horn continued to blare.
As he drove on, he continued, “We all have our jobs to do. Your job is to get on my cab safely. My job is to take you to your destination safely. If the bus driver can’t wait & decides to blast his horn it is his right to do so. And maybe he’s in a bad mood. But you don’t have to let the sound make you frighten & lose your balance, and I musn’t drive recklessly because I’m irritated by the driver.”
Last week the young boys at the tuition centre asked me if I knew who The Rock was. It was their way of checking if someone of their grandmother’s generation knew anything about their interests.
“Know Your Role!” – The Rock ( Dwayne Johnson)
To their amusement, I not only could tell them The Rock’s real name but also put on one of his signature poses. One boy chortled admiringly when I bellowed The Rock’s famous slogan , “Know Your Role!” 😂
Recalling The Rock’s, “Know Your Role,” brought back memories of the cab driver’s insightful lesson on what doing our job, fulfilling responsibilities & expressing our rights can mean.
So regardless of how long it takes or how hard it is, if it’s a path that we’ve chosen and a role we’ve taken on, we must play it out faithfully, even if someone else’s role is to specialise in derailing us by placing obstacles in our way.
Every birthday, regardless of age, is to be cherished. Celebrated in big ways or small, observing the occasion is an act of gratitude, not a gauge of one’s popularity.
Ilario learning to hold Oliver.
It’s amazing that between showing him how to hold a cat properly when he was 7 to looking at his compositions when he was 16 and discussing internship options for his studies just recently, 21 years have gone by just like that!
Studying GCE O level with Oliver.
So this morning I sent a text to the boy who has brought nothing but smiles to his mom & dad good health, kind heart and wise mind as he steps into adulthood to exercise his rights and responsibilities.
Edusave Award with dad Showing gratitude to mom at Edusave Award.
Bare faced and spotting a short bob, the harbour staff assigned to assist me on wheelchair to the ferry boarding gate looked like a student.
It was June 2019, and I was crossing from Kinmen to Xiamen for my flight back to Singapore.
Harbour Girl addressed me as “Ah Yi,” meaning aunt in mandarin and asked kindly if I would like to use the washroom or buy souvenirs before she took me to the boarding gate.
When we passed the windlion display, I asked if she could take pictures of me with Kinmen’s Mythical Guardian.
Her unease at my request looked as if I had asked her to perform a brain surgery on me. I learnt that she had been told that she couldn’t take nice pictures.
“Don’t worry. I’m very beautiful. You simply cannot take a bad picture of me!” I assured her in my desperation to have my last shots with Kinmen’s ancient mascot.
Upon my very ridiculous claim, Harbour Girl burst out laughing. Her hesitation evaporated.
So she took my phone and started snapping non-stop. As she trained my phone camera on me, while moving around freely, I felt her gaiety.
By then it didn’t really matter how the pictures turned out.
Till now, I still keep the 22 shots she took. I have no intention of deleting them. They were the last pictures of me before I left Kinmen. But mostly because they remind me of a very lovely & happy Kinmen daughter.
Her parting words when she walked me up the ferry were,”Ah Yi, I’m very happy to be of service. When you visit again, I will look out for you. I will remember you.”
As a noun, the harbour is associated with safety and shelter. As a verb, it has a negative connotation of keeping a dark thought or feeling over a long period of time.
Harbour Girl guided me safely to my boat. May her enthusiasm to indulge an old lady’s wish to take pictures with the windlion free her from all doubts that she might be harbouring about her capabilities. 😊🙏
Handstamped envelopes & cards for my tutees taking their first national exam (PSLE).
In 3 days’ time 12-year-old primary school children across Singapore will be sitting for their Primary School Leaving Exam (PSLE).
Yesterday was my final English practice with the exam candidates. A few of them had worked with me since last year.
Towards the end of the session, I told them I had prepared a well wishing gift for each of them.
Friendship bands from Nepal
“I still have the friendship band you gave me last year,” the boy who tied the handwoven fabric to his key chain said proudly on ZOOM. Another told me that the gift from Nepal that had travelled 3000 KM is always in his pencil case.
I had given them the friendship band from Nepal at the beginning of last year when they were in Primary 5. I had wished for these children to be hardy and resourceful like the people and land where their gifts came from.
This time I selected decorative paper clips as part of the farewell gift for my tutees. Enclosed with a card in a handstamped envelope I wish the children peace & joy, and the ability to hold their knowledge with ease for their own benefit, and to benefit others.
Doraemon, the cat from the future to accompany the kids taking their exam.
The rabbit lantern of my childhood is alive & well. Pic source: shanghai.com
Of all the lanterns that were bought for me in my childhood, I remember the rabbit lantern best for the following reasons:
Firstly, my dad bought it. Secondly I was born in the year of the hare. Thirdly, its frame was wrapped in shredded white crepe paper to simulate fur. Fourthly, and most importantly, the whole lantern was set ablaze as soon as the candle that was meant to light it from within tilted, causing fire to meet paper.
Did the wire holding the candle in place not do its job? Or was my dad too clumsy in the lighting ceremony?
You can imagine the shock & pain of a 5 year old seeing her beloved rabbit lantern which she had been hugging all afternoon going up in flames and turning into ashes in seconds.
Me at the age where a paper lantern rabbit was my whole world. (1960s)
I was inconsolable. My young dad was traumatised.
In the mid-autumn festivals that followed, he would buy only battery operated lanterns for my brother and I. And no more crepe paper rabbits!
This evening I was pleasantly surprised to find that the lantern design that I loved half a century ago still exists!
The current model now has wheels, presumably for greater stability to minimise accidents like mine.
Come tomorrow night, I’m sure somewhere in some homes celebrating mid-autumn, paper lanterns will still catch fire and go up in flames.
There will be tears over the destruction & loss of a much loved and perhaps even irreplaceable design, but that shall not keep us from seeking solutions to continue the celebration.
Lisa Ong 