I'll never forget...

Summer is coming to an end. Everyone I know is excited for the new school year to begin. I was too, until Saturday.

I got an e-mail from my mum, letting me know that one of the dearest person to me, passed away.

How kind of her. AN E-MAIL???? REALLY? I think my family can do better than that.

My grandmother's sister was in her 90s. Even though she was not in the best condition, health wise, she still tells me stories and jokes about everything you can imagine, every time I see her.

I can honestly say I've never met anyone in my life who gets so excited and sincerely happy to see me, every single time.

She saw me grew up and taught me almost everything I know, about life. Whenever I'm back in Malaysia, I know she's the one person I can see, knowing that she wouldn't judge, like the rest of my family do, and that she cared, sincerely.

My best girlfriends wouldn't judge, but they know nothing, compared to what she knew, she had after all, lived almost a century, before we even existed.

I've always thought to myself that even though I'm far away from people who mean the most to me, my family and 3 of my best girls, I would fly home, or wherever they are, in a heartbeat... and leave everything behind.

I would always dismiss my grandmothers' worries that if anything happened to them, I wouldn't be back in time.

Now that the time has come, I hesitated.

I hate myself for being so attached. To my work, to school and to the friends I've made in this country.

I wish I would have the guts to just buy the next ticket and fly back. But what good will it do though? I got another e-mail from my mum telling me that she'll be cremated today.

Now that I know it'll be too late for me to go halfway across the world,

I wish I could take at least a week off, just to reflect and try my best to reminisce the times I had with her.

But do I really wanna be of those people who would make this an excuse? I'm not that weak, am I? I know I'm stronger than that. Much stronger.

I anticipated that this will be a crazy semester, I just didn't expect it to start like this.

A co-worker once joked that every time we had new writers/copy editors, they would have to resign because one of their family member would pass away.

I laughed.