-after the rain-

I fell alseep while putting the green mud on my face. Was ready to slumber but forced myself out of the bed to read. But while reading, i tore myself away from the book and took over this monitor. Wanted to finish up the stories of my family because i want to get into something else. But i enjoyed sharing about my family especially my grandparents. They are wonderful people.

I just read Simon's, Weizhong's and Sarah's blog. Wow.. lots of changes. Cool. All black blackground with nice font colours.. compared to mine... Sigh.. Why do people want to make HTML so complicated?? Anywayz--

So cool.. the rain has stopped and moon has begin to give her shine again.
Rain brings back the fond memories back in my grandparents' house. Because of the rain, my grandparents, uncles and aunties were have to be called to an early day retirement. I like it. Everyone would stay put in the house watching television together...

My grandfather is a great man. I will tell you why.

I cant remember how old i was.. there was once my cousin, Wen Shing and i got so bored that we went to ransack our youngest auntie's room. We took out her make up kit and declared ourselves young artists. Happily, we played wayang... terror stroke when my auntie came back and found me, only me, with that stubborn lipstick that refuses to go from my lips, she gave me a good treshing and chased me out of the house in the late night. She locked the gate, and there i was, outside alone in darkness.. the heavy concreted stool was my companion, giving me security as i leaned against it, seeking comfort. The next morning, i found myself sleeping on my grandfather's bed.

Oh yes.. more than this....

When we were studying in Singapore, he would come here often to visit us and bring us to the places my sis and i wanted to go and buy whatever things we want to buy. He was our santa claus. I always wanted to play his host because i live here.. but in the end, it always the other way round. He would bring us to swimming pool and wait patiently for us for an hour while we soak in the water. Whats more admiring was that he came specially just to bring us back to Malaysia to spend the holidays with them, and he will bring us back to Singapore again. He was already quite old at that time..

In Malaysia, every morning, he would let my sis and i sleep to the fullest. Breakfast would be ready on the table each morning without fail. I remembered i woke up early sometimes just to watched my cousins dressed for school and hoping that time would travel in the speed of light so that i can play with them again. I will sit on the sofa facing the road, watching how my three cousins squeezed on a motorcycle, while my grandfather drives them to school. Come to think of it, its really funny. Three little children, hugging each other from behind and puut puut puut... off they went...

While my cousins were in school, sis and i would stay at home practically doing nothing. Lying here and there and watching my grandfather work outside the house. He spread the rubber sheets and coco seeds on the hot bitumen ground to keep them dry. He always wear the straw hat and carry a shovel on his shoulder, just like a typical farmer. But to me, he is more than a farmer. I still remembered beads of sweat flows down his tanned back and it seems like every sweat was smiling because that was his livelihood. And had brought him so far...

Disturbing the nature was our forte.
We loved to catch butterflies with our bare hands, deprived them from flying, challenged each other in catching tadpoles and houseflies. My cousin, Xiao Di (same age as me, Wenshing's brother) always the winner of course. He is the smartest among us but naughtiest too. I still remembered the sickening bag of drowned flies he showed me after his victory. youckS! We gave no peace to the millipedes too. The sight of seeing them curled up in shocked made us feel shiok. Spiders! We like to make fun of spiders, tapping them down from our hand, suspending them in the air.. while they tried to struggle back to the top, we tap them down again. For me i would purposely wait for them to climb all the way up to the proximity of my hand, then i gave a hard tap and made them fall a big time. Well, their determination is what i have learnt.
There was once, one of my older cousin, who was an "ah beng" (Xiao di and Wen Shing's big borther), brought a few of us to explore er.. not a very deep forest which is just beside our house.. We stopped by a stream and caught shrimps and tiny fishes (ikan bilis, maybe). Ignorantly, we brought our 'harvest' home and fried them with salt, without the adults knowledge, and ate them. Thank God we are still alive. Haha. That was my first and last visitation to the forest. Quite a fearful one.. because i couldnt identify where i was.. trees was everywhere and most horrifying was that they looked the same. We ended the day by stealing our neighbour's papayas who lived behind us. We sliced it, served with vingear and chilli to the family. Hee. I was very young then.. think in primary four the most.. ?

Soon, we covet for toys.. but no money.. An evil thought came to us. We knew that my grandfather has a huge, huuge milo can full of coins on top of his cupboard. We decided to withdraw some unoffically. Xiao di and I was the one who climbed to the top and GRABBED as much coins as our tiny hand could hold.. We wrapped the coins with my skirt and ran out of the house bending forward, holding my skirt to 'protect' the coins. (my grandparents were watching television in the living room) Lo and behold.. the last thing we ever want to happen, happened... half way through the big living room, the coins came dingling off my skirt and fell to the the ground. My accomplices quickly pick them up and we ran out of the house as fast as possible, to our bicycle and rode off to the provision shop down the streets. I do not know my grandfather know or not.. but he didnt ask any questions.

On hot afternoon day, we would open our ears big to try to catch a ringing sound of bells. When we heard it from distance.. we would jumped out of the sofa and anticipate.. my grandparents would give us money (automatically) and the happy children would run out of the house, waiting eagerly for the sight of the ice-cream man..

I told you, my grandfather is a great man. =o)

Wow.. time passes fast! I targetted to sleep by midnight... I have turned into cinder and rags.
I will come back and pick up my glass shoe - You will know that my grandmother is a great woman. I will tell you why.