So I’ve been back in Malaysia for about a week now, after saying “Goodbye for now” to Chiang Mai, my home for the past 13 months.
In KL, I played a few gigs around town and coincidentally, my youtube brother AJ was having a concert in KL whilst I was there so I sung a few songs at a guest at his Red Roses concert too! It was an awesome night and AJ’s fans were amazing as always!
Another gig I did was with Reza Salleh, a good friend of mine and awesome musician.. should check out his facebook page for tunes! We had a songwriters’ round at Publika @ The Bee alongside songwriter Rendra Zawiwi! Had a lot of fun up on stage and was a chilled out night sharing original music
Being back feels really good. I’m not much of a city girl but learning to appreciate the wonders of Kuala Lumpur - especially the food potential when you have the right guide :p
My parents arrived from London late on tuesday evening, and my father immediately started the mahjong, and my mother went out and came back with 7 durians!
Yesterday we came by train to Ipoh, my Dad’s hometown and where my Uncle Tom is resting. He has cancer. Uncle Tom is my favourite Uncle and as he doesn’t have any kids, I’d say he feels pretty close to me too. Well.. I didn’t recognise him at first when I walked in the room, afterall, it had only been 6 months since I’d seen him and yet he’d changed so drastically.
He was like a skeleton in bed with no hair, and his voice had changed massively too.. it was hard at first to make out what he was saying but I’m getting used to it now. He looked so weak and frail.. only one year ago he was visiting me in Chiang Mai for christmas. Wow… now I see with my own eyes how fast cancer can deteriorate a body. I had to leave the room to avoid crying in front of him. I was a bit scared of this unfamiliar image as well.
He’s known about the cancer for 10 months and they’ve been using the famous Sabah Snake Grass very strictly according to the rules. It seems that it hasn’t helped though :( Certainly hasn’t cured him. Recently, he went for some radiotherapy and that seemed to have helped the pain at least. He’s now bedridden with my Auntie being his full time carer at home. My Auntie Maggie is a wonderful, tireless carer and nurse.
After spending more time with him when he’s awake, I see he’s still my Uncle Tom and there’s nothing to be afraid of. He still has the same humour, the same stern mind but he gets tired easily and can’t even read the paper for long. He says he has hope, but my family has been telling me that he’s prepared to go now and has accepted it as a fact.. can one have both? Is he trying to put on a brave face for me?
Sigh.. I don’t have too much time left in Ipoh.. maybe about a week. I’m heading to Malacca and SIngapore to see family, and from Singapore I’ve planned to fly to Taiwan to start the next chapter of my life. All this is planned and everything booked.. and now of course, it’s difficult to think about leaving him.
One thing’s for sure, I wanna spend as much time with him as possible; want to ask those questions I was a bit scared to ask when I was a kid. Uncle Tom always seemed so serious and stern, but that’s why his laughter was even more worth the earning! We’re both adults and the playing field is more level now.. I want to explore the wonderful mind that I respect so much.
I Love to make him laugh.
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Today I came home a pint of blood lighter and went to Uncle Tom’s room to see how he was doing. He said he’d been bored cos he’d been alone in the house all day. I chatted to him before and just now after dinner, pestering him to tell me about how he met Auntie Maggie :p 
