Dinner

"You really use [your] heart," she said, meaning that I really took a lot of effort. She grimaced  as she painfully swallowed a small bite of soba noodles. "Thank you..."

It was nothing, really. Fresh chicken soup with tomatoes and onions (both high in antioxidants and flavourful in soup), stir-fried sweet potato leaves with garlic, and a grilled salted fish. I left the food to stand for a while before asking her to eat, so that it would be easier on her throat. Cut wax apples for dessert.  It really was nothing, and I was even afraid that it was not nutritious enough. Mum said she had no appetite, and I tried to fix something that was, at least in my mind, appetising. I knew she did not want to eat, and in some ways she was only eating because I made the food. I ate quickly, forgetting even to sample the food, just eating mindlessly because I need to eat too.

In the span of an afternoon, her voice has almost completely disappeared. For some reason, even though it has already been three days after her latest (and last) radiotherapy, she is still feeling the side-effects. Losing her voice, I was told by a friend, would be one of them. I thought if the treatment stopped, she would gradually recover. But no, she has even more difficulty swallowing and eating, it seems, and I fear for her weight, even though my own weight has not fared much better in the past month or so. The stress, the worries, the fears are simply too much sometimes...

We took a walk after dinner, just around the neighbourhood, and to a department store nearby. It was a quiet walk, for I did not want her to have to exert herself talking. A group of Falung-gong practitioners meditated in silence, reminding me again that today is the 22nd anniversary of the Tiananmen Massacre. How many people actually took notice, I wondered.

To the bookstore we went, more specifically to the travel section. Together we picked up a guide to Canada, and browsed excitedly through the pages, admiring the beautiful pictures of Canada's landscape and sights. Perhaps the excitement and anticipation of the upcoming trip 'healed' mum, at least for a moment, and her voice was less strained, less coarse. I bought the book for her, hoping that browsing through it will make her forget her condition, and make her more and more determined, physically and mentally to travel.