There were tears.
Growing-up, my brother and I used to giggle when my mum wrote Hari Raya cards to her family in Malacca. It was a mere 6-hour drive away from Singapore. But during those times, we could only afford to visit them once a year and telephone calls were expensive, hence far and few in between. So every fasting month, she would write those cards to her parents and each of her siblings. She shared with us her words and thoughts. It was emotional for her because she missed them so much. But we laughed because of the language she used - Malay, only in an antiquated, formal manner. For example, "ayahanda" and "bonda" for father and mother, and "kekanda" and "adinda" for her brothers and sisters. It's as if your mother was writing in Shakespeare's English.
Fast-forward 25 years later and I now find myself at the receiving end of her Hari Raya cards. She still writes in the same formal language and old-fashioned spelling. Only I am not laughing anymore. Just grateful. And a little tearful we couldn't be with our families on this day.
Selamat Hari Raya, Maaf Zahir Batin.
4 comments:
I share your sadness but hope that you'd find our family as a tolerable substitution here.
you guys are not substitution - you are family :)
i feel like that about my family during our holidsays too.
I hope it gets less gloomy with each year :)
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