30F

210214.0630

Seat 30F 

On board flight UA 849 from SJC-DEN, plane about to depart. I slept perhaps two and a  half hours yesterday, due to a sudden change in plans and a last minute search on my newly acquired pad (brother helped choose it for me, bless him...) for a place to stay tonight.

I was out the door around 5.30, and originally intended to walk to the airport, a distance  of a mile and a half, but with two big suitcase and two carry ons and a weakened and aching chest, and a heavy winter coat, would infitely feel much further. Luckily, and the first stroke of good luck since turning thirty (at least according to local time... I technically turned thirty yesterday, tpe time... But the changes in time zones and flying has confused me), there was a taxi parked right next to the gas station next to my motel. The man just happened to be there and taking a toilet break. He saved me the long walk and tiredness of having to haul my suitcase all the way to the airport. 

This is the flight I originally scheduled back in January, a part of the crazy itinerary from YUL-(exam).YYZ-DEN-LAX-(Hand in hand)-TPE---(Happy Music Time) NRT-(788)-SJC-DEN-YUL. The routing is so ridiculous (and source of raised eye brows, even from a checkin staff!) because of the Hello Kitty and B788 jets I wanted to take, and due to the availability of the sectors redeeming US Airways miles. Earlier this month, I actually bought a flight directly to Montreal for today, hoping to be at home with my cat on my birthday. But last night, just before bed, I cancelled that flight. On a whim, just like that.

Yes, I am extremely wishy washy and often things dont always go according to original plans (which is a source of frustration and joke to some...). But honestly, how can life not change? How can plans always be realised when everything, all factors, all moods and moments are changing all the time? Get stuck to plans and be unbudging or unyielding, and you suffer more. Change and adapt, be free like the blowing of the wind, and you are set free and freeer.

Another reason why I did not fly home directly today is because I don't wish to face any one today, especially today, and it's easier to be not home than to have to explain to people where I am or when I'm coming home and why I don't wish to see anyone on my birthday. It's tiring. Especially having to put on a happy face and be there completely caught offguard by surprises or anything that will make upset and feel embarrassed (even if they were wellmeaning). In particular, I am avoiding one person, as I just don't know how to face him any more and we have become so estranged, mainly because I have really reduced communication with him to spare myself any more hurt and unsolicited hopes and desires (something I should have done two, three years ago, just as everyone told me too). Besides, why worry or bother someone who made clear we are nothing more than "friends" now?  As far as most people know, i'm still in Taiwan. And I've not acccessed my phone or Facebook for the past few days. Out of sight, out of mind as they say.

I wish to keep a low profile, and to be incognito and not enter my third decade on a completely uncharted and unplanned note by going somewhere new and unfamiliar and by distancing myself from the people and places of the past. 

Here's to a new year, a new decade  (of my life), to real peace and joy, true love and many, many new wonderful adventures and beautiful encounters. 

Prayers...

I cannot explain why... Standing in front of mum's and dad's memorials, my eyes moistened. And I could not stop crying...

I turned away so that I am not seen.

I could not stop crying.

I could not stop the heartwrenching, throatchoking, trembling emotions trigerred by this deep, deep sense of pain and loss. I could not bear the void I felt inside...

My brother held his son and approached mum's memorial. My nephew giggled and  called out "A-ma", Taiwanese cor grandmother, almost as soon as he saw mum's picture. He said "miao-mi", meaning cat, because on one picture, there's a cat resting on my mum's shoulder, a picture taken in southern France in a remote village. Everyone laughed, I smiled.

But despite the smile, I felt so empty inside. I am again here on my own, not in the sense that I am alone, but in the sense I really have no one I can share my deepest feelings and desires with. Coming to see mum and dad on my thirtieth birthday underlined that sense of isolation and loneliness, that sense of abandonment and longing for a family of my own.

I wiped my tears, but they kept on coming. Uncontrollable, powerful and so laden with longing and memories. The emotions were so unexpected, so wild, just like the pouring rain and winds outside and the crashing and violent waves on the Pacific on this day...

I miss you so much, mum, dad....

(Lunar) birthday

It's a good day to offer prayers and food to and to worship the ancestors. For two days I've been running around and buying lots of foods and fruits and drinks, neglecting my ill health and body aches in the process. Somehow, the chest pains seem to feel much worse than before, so much so I have trouble taking deep breaths. The doctor said I should really rest and take it easy... But how can I? So much to do!

Today's the Twentieh day of of the first lunar month. A good day to worship the deceased. It's also my (lunar) birthday.

And what better day to go visit my parents than today?

Sleepless in Taipei

Midnight. I left the hotel that I was sharing with my brother and his family. I could not sleep, and from the experience last night, its unlikely I'd get any sleep.

Brother's snoring is really bad. It's so loud and so irritating, like a machine that needs oiling, badly. I know he snores. I've experienced it  first hand on family holidays (something he probably inherited from mum...), and also those days he was ay home and staying in the living room. But I'm also somewhat concerned by it, for it seems to cause him discomfort, at least from what I can hear. It seems to get worse with age. So bad even ear buds (yes, I went to stay with them prepared....) did not help block out the noise. I told him he should go someone about the problem. I asked his wife if it bothered her, but she says she's used to it and doesn't mind much.

So at midnight I decided to venture out into the streets of Taipei. I hailed a taxi and made my way to my cousin's. Lucky she was still awake and could offer me refuge for the night-- a night I need a good sleep to prepare for the big day tomorrow.

Home?

How symbolic...
Originally my brother and his family wanted to take professional pictures in Taipei, next to mum's old house, our old home, but because of the rainy weather the photo shoot had to be cancelled and postponed.

It will now be done on my birthday, in Taichung, the city where my sisterinlaw is from, where my first port of call was three weeks ago.

Taipei doesn't seem to be our/my home anymore..

Raid

160214.1524

I felt so embarrassed. I called my brother's mother-in-law and said I'm going to visit her. I did want to before I left the country to thank her for hospitality, but in fact I had a "mission" to fulfill and needed to go to her place to "raid" her house in search for items belonging to my late mother. 

I probably made too much of a big deal out of this, especially as she did tell me to take whatever I see at her place. that belonged to mum. And there are plenty of things, from duvets to pillows, from cups to a massage machine, from the formosan hinoki wood barrel (for foot-soaking) to wooden furniture and decorations that used to hang on mum's walls to fridge magnets that I bought for her (of Canada. Quebec, of the cirque du Soleil shows we went to see together...). So many things that belonged to mum and that were in mum's house before, are now at my brother's mother-in-law's place.

All because when it was time to pack everything away last year, I was not there. So out of convenience, they shipped evrything to  one address. Much to the surprise, or perhaps even disdain, of mum's siblings, especially her youngest sister. So two weeks ago she asked me yo go and see what else there is left, especially of mum's wardrobe. 

There aren't much clothes left. There were three bags of clothes that were collected, but becaese my auntie did not go pick them up (and my brother did not bother to ship them to her...), most of the clothes have been donated to charity. There are some that my sisterinlaw kept for herself. The best things, the branded and expensive things. 

What can I say? In my mind, if my sisterinlaw could use the clothes, especially the winter ones in Europe, why not? Am I to ask for them back so I can give them to my auntie? How embarrassing that would be, to ask for clothes that someone has been wearing for over a year and half.

So I went in the house of my brother's mother-in-law today, and I left with a porcelain cup and a pillow that turns into a down blanket for myself. The rest of the things, though there are many memories attached to them, I just cannot bear to go through and "raid"... How do you take away from someone tea cups and plates (even if they are Wedgwood...), cutlery and items of fufnitture that have de facto been owned by someone for almost two years? 

I went in embarrassed and came out embarrased. In the end, I identified two lovely duvets and pillows and asked for them to be shipped to my cousin (my auntie's daughter), thinking she could use them most. I'm not sure what my brother will say if he hears of this, or what his mother-in-law thinks of me. 

I'm just trying to give my auntie something to remember her sister with. It's not a pleasant task to go into someone's house and take things... And it's not just because it's hard to go through mum's belongings again and having to relive the memories and to hurt again. 

I tried to do the best I can.