Much love

Much Love

At 4:21pm today, I told you I was craving for Spaghetti. Then at 7pm, you asked me to go down to collect the spaghetti bolognaise you bought from Delifrance and take the donut you bought. Then I fell too ill to eat, it was a bout of flu and some serious shivering, despite being layered in my thick already-layered sports club jacket and under the not too thick, but not necessarily thin blanket. Pish then commented on how I'm so fortunate to have such close and nice friends. And I agree, true friends are those who do things without asking, who do what they know would please you, and who'll travel the distance to be with you when you need them most. Friends and others like Kai, Susu, all my tkg babes, jip, adilah, adibah, hani etc etc etc. Thank you, really, from the bottom of my heart. Especially to those of you who came to be with me on the day of my grnadpa's funeral. I love you all, you are the precious few I know I can count on, come rain or shine. If you're readng this, know that, the feeling's mutual.:)

Allah loves him more.

My grandpa returned to Allah SWT on the 19th of Dec at 1:21am. May Allah bless his soul and save him a spot in one of his Heavens, Amin. To those who visited and who have suppoted me all this while, I'm greatly indebted and highly grateful. To those who care, do say a prayer in his name, Mohamed Ghouse Bin Mohamed Ibrahim. Thanks darls.

I'll have you to miss

I wanted to update on Linkin Park but I haven't got the mood to somehow, knowing that there are bigger things in my life to reflect on. This afternoon at about 2 plus pm Sharon the nurse from the Hospice and another unfamiliar looking doctor came over to check on my grandpa. They did the usual check-up, asking the routine questions, like what medication he's on now, does he uriniate or pass motion, does he have vomiting tendencies, does he eat, etc, etc. I was there standing in the middle of the room answering the questions, and at times translating the questions to my grandma who knows better, and then translating them back to the doctor and the nurse. At one point, Sharon the nurse called out to my grandpa loudly, and his eyes shifted to her direction, and she commented on how he can still respond to our calls. I felt proud of my grandpa then, cos I realised then how much of a fighter he's been, how brave he's been to bear all this pain, with very minimal wincing and shouts. How despite the toll of this liver cancer on him, he has remained so strong and fought back. 3 months ago, on the 13th of August, the very first day of school for this sem, we received the crushing news of my grandpa's condition. That day, the doctor who spoke to my aunt gave my grandpa a time period of 3 months at most. Today, its the 16th of nov, 3 days past the 3 months period, and the doctor who came over today when asked by my grandmother, gave my grandpa at most another 4 days to live. Whats it with these numbers? Its like stamping this 'Best before' date on him. First 3 months, now 4 more days, soon it'll be hours. Time catches up so much it makes me want to cry. I've been so busy with school, my attention's been taken up mostly by the endless assignments and presentations, and now I've left like this sick child with a small heart, the size of a baby's palm, worried crushed, anxious. I don't want to lose my grandpa, I don't want to imagine how life will be later, without him. Hani always said she admires my courage and my ability to cope with things, but today I think I finally realise the reason behind this apparent ease of 'coping' with this tragic ordeal. I've just tried to push it away from my mind, never really seriously considering the possibility of my grandpa gone. Everytime I'm with him, I either cry or I end up feeling slightly irritated by his incessant requests for me to scratch his back. Oh God, I don;t knwo if I can even continue typing this. I remember that as a child, I would frequently pray for Allah to take my grandmother,mother and me together should the time come for one of us to go, simply because I didn;t want anyone of us to have to bear the pain of losing the other, maybe I should have included my grandpa in those prayers. But I guess it was the natural thing to do since as a child I've grown up only with my grandma and mum. I don't blame myself of course for anything, its just that this pain of losing someone you love so much is terrible. I've always admired people who have managed to get their lives back on track after losing someone so dear, and time has come for me to do the same. I want to cry my eyes out, I want to reminisce on all the many memories I have of my grandpa, the man who has always been selfless when it concerns his family. He sacrificed as a man right up to his early 70s when he was still a security guard at the Singapore Cricket Club. He'd tell us those Sang Kanchil, Momo Taro stories repeatedly starting with the same unfaltered enthusiasm as if we were hearing it for the first time, relate his endless painful memories during WW2 when he was oftentimes abused for looking too much like an Eurasian. Life was tough for my grandfather, but he stuck through all of that, managing to raise a family who will forever be indebted to him.
If there's anything I'm happy about though, its the fact that I have constantly reminded my grandpa of my love for him, and how I will strive to make him proud and how he ought to be proud for having truly lived his life, whose success ought to only be measured not by the mass of wealth accumulated but by the number of people who'd miss him when he's no longer around.
Okay, I believe that this ordeal will leave me a changed person, Inshaallah for the better. I'm imagining myself in Germany next year doing my exchange program, looking both forlorn and wise, carrying this past in my heart, and having to bear that feeling of missing him endlessly but knowing that he'll still be with me every step of the way.
I feel like changing my life completely, be the better person I've always wanted to be, disciplined, more in touch with Islam, humble, the quiet achiever who's aware of herself in all that she does and decides. Inshaallah. Allah, guide me through this and thank you for having blessed me with an angel for a grandfather.

LINKIN PARK WAS AWESOME!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Updates soon!

Oh this is my 81st post. Thats coincidentally my grandpa's age . But so what right, I mean I bet a thousand, million other things are 81, like how there may be 81 trees on a certain street, or 81 family members in a certain place, or someone's house unit number is 81 or somehing, well anything. Haha, I am so rambling. Anyway, speaking of which, last tuesday I had my german vocab test which followed 2 nights of 'intensive' memorising, -effective or not, I'll find out soon- and if you take german 3 in NUS as well or you have frens who take the module, you'd know that there are a good THREE Vocab lists to memorise for each vocab test, and each list can be like a good 6 pages each. SO YES, unless you've got a superbrainiac over-porous sponge of a brain, it is unlikely that you can remember EVERYWORD, especially if you do the whole memorising thing last minute lah which is obvious always the case for me. But I digress. There was this particular word that my eyes managed to catch hold of just minutes before the test, and it was "die Leere, ~n" : which means emptiness like emotinal emptiness, actually I managed to cram in one other word just secs before the test too, but this word none of us had trouble remembering- "Kopflos" merely because it means panic-stricken- no prizes for guessing who the unlucky ones were-. At the end of the day, I had grand plans of hibernation, but all hopes of catching up on that necessary beauty sleep were dashed, when I realised I had my EDB presentation to submit the next day (which is today lah) and so I was staying up late to rush through that, until my body and mind conspired and decided they could no longer take anymore sleep deprivation and at that point, I guess I must have been in a rather sub-conscious state of mind, where I'm both alert and and dazed in a trance-like way. At this point, I typed 'Leere" out onto one of the slides I was preparing. I mean wah laoooo, hahah what kind of sad reflection of my current mental state is that?! I mean just like I said, Leere means emptiness in german, and to write such a thing when ur sub-conscious is highly disturbing cos what's THAT supposed to mean?! I have an empty mind ah?! Hahahahaha. But yeah I've always had such experiences lah, there was this other time when I was similarly shagged beyond redemption but stubborn enough to want to stay awake through the night, and the next thing I knew I was writing so many weird food names and ingredients, my notebook was starting to resemble a full recipe. I remember in particular, teh word 'chilli'. Hahaha, disturbing la. But interesting right? I suppose this whole state of sub-consciousness is akin to that of drunkeness where there is a temporary lapse of judgment, freeing you to say or do what you otherwise might not. Sometimes that could be good though eh, I mean imagine if you have a big womanizer husband, who happens to be World's greatest actor as well, and then one day he comes home drunk and lets his guards down, and ends up spilling all the beans of his extra-marital affairs. Then again, some women belonging to the staunch 'What I don' know won't hurt me" faction may prefer not knowing, which is something I cannot comprehend but shan't talk about today.

Okay, I am so shagged, I best not continue.. But recent updates: School is hectic, if not crazier that ever. I made two German friends on Tuesday (Alex & Mark). I was so excited to find that they're germans that I practically did a cheer. =) Today has re-enforced my belief that Allah is truly great. Mashallah~

Alles sind jetzt in Ordnung.

Today I realised that I'm quite a winner, that my english is better than that of the average NUS student and that I do unintentionally appear to be quite an uncaring, no nonsense bitch: which isn't true right. Quite affected by the third realisation, especially when its one of my friends who feel that way. Mashaallah. In other news, I have survived CRAZY- two MAJOR presentations-German orals- Wednesday! Yeay, life's back in order now, gotta hit the books already.