In the Mooood For A Birthday

I had just come over to Australia, and was living the life of a squalid student. There was no television at home, so we often just watched the oven, we had a dinosaur of an iMac with no internet connection, and we didn't even have a telephone.

We would brave the dark winter nights in the dangerous suburb of NM where we were at the time just to call home from a payphone booth.

It was in that payphone booth that I spoke to my family, the brief fifteen or so minutes spent trying to summarise what had been going on in our lives throughout the week.

"So, Grace took her driving exam today," Mum says.

[open folder_Grace]


[open folder_ Driving Lessons]

"You know, ah," my sister said, complaining, "My driving instructor was damn bad ah, today!"

"Why?" I asked, remembering my painful driving lessons and how my brother had to take the test five times, and I had to take it twice, and just luckily passed. Driving instructors could be a nasty lot.

You would be too, I suppose, if your whole life was spent letting novice drivers gamble with your life daily so that they could finally drive the car that Daddy bought them.

"Yeah, he said my clutch work was damn bad!" she frowned, recalling the day.

"We were driving around the taman, you know," she said, a smile creeping over her face, "and then when we stopped at the traffic lights, I was having trouble with the clutch lah, you know, so the car was shaking like mad the whole time."

"You know what that bah-gger say to me ah? He said, 'Chan, chan chan, chan to see te chut lei ah!' (Shake, shake, shake, shake until my sh!t also come out ah!)"

At this point she bursts out into her trademark laughter, and brushes the day off her shoulders. I can't help but laugh, too, imagining the driver in incontinence pads as a result of one too many clutch-related vibrations.

[Close folder_Driving Lessons]


[Close folder_Grace]

"So, how did she do?" I braced myself for the worst.

"She passed!" came my mother's excited voice.

"Sure or not?" I say. "Got pay kopi money (bribe) is it?"

"No lah," Mum said. "She's very goood...."

My little sister has trumped us on so many occasions I've lost count. She had done really well in her SPM (O Level equivalent) as well that year, and although the road of medicine has been tough, she battled it with the passion of someone on a mission.

She remains one of my favourite storytellers as well, giving stories the life they deserve.

So here's to you, my little sister, who is bigger than us in so many ways. Happy birthday!