Nostalgia: Reminiscing on those who have passed on
Current events, sights and sounds, and many other triggers can lead us onto the memory lane of nostalgia.
As I prepared for the Lunar Chinese New Year celebrations, I found it interesting that, on numerous occasions, I reminisced of many family members from the generation before mine.
This has never happened to me in the past and so I thought that, instead of dismissing my nostalgia, I would indulge it and see what I could remember about my dearly departed relatives.
Surprisingly, it was the information I had about my paternal aunts (my father’s sisters) and the good times I shared with them that were preserved clearly in my mind. This could possibly be because, as a member of my maiden family (the CHO family) I was in a similar position as they had been — daughters who were married off, who bore children carrying their husbands’ family names, and who were always addressed as “Mrs”.
I had five paternal aunts, all of whom had been ladies of great personalities. And this is what I remember most of them and from them.
Number 1 Aunt
I had never met her in person as she passed away at a very young age. But these are the stories I heard of her.
She was the most beautiful of the sisters and also the smartest one. In order to further her education, she left with her fiancé to continue her tertiary education in Beijing, China in the 1930s. In those days, it was quite the adventure for a young lady to travel from Malaysia to China for university education.
Unfortunately, while she was in China, she met with unfortunate circumstances and passed away. I was told that my grandmother — her mother — was totally heartbroken.
In order to make the situation “better” for my grandmother, upon graduating and returning from China, her fiancé posthumously married my No. 1 aunt. This is an interesting practice because after her fiancé married another lady, she stood in as my No. 1 aunt.
Number 2 and 3 Aunts
As they were twins, it is not possible to write about them separately. Despite being identical twins, somehow the younger twin, my third aunt, seemed to be the more beautiful of the two. This was always a source of friendly friction between them.
These two aunts had been our baby sitters on numerous happy occasions, and we would always implore them to tell us stories.
The older twin, accustomed to being labeled the less beautiful one, would tell us the story of two sisters, one called “Pock Marked” and the other “Beauty”.
The Tale of the Two Sisters
As the story goes, the less beautiful sister (Pock Marked) was married to a poor farmer and Beauty to an aristocratic family of stature and wealth.
Having no beauty to distract her, Pock Marked did a great job as a farmer’s wife, working the land and reaping bountiful harvests. She bore the farmer three healthy and strong sons. With hard work and the help of her sons, Pock Marked became wealthy and rich with happiness.
On the other hand, Beauty’s family harboured much jealousy and envy. In such an environment, Beauty became discontent and her life ended unhappily.
At the end of each story-telling session, my second aunt would smirk at us. I think she enjoyed telling us this story, as it was a reflection of her life and her more beautiful twin.
As I recollect my memories of my third aunt, not only was she more good looking, but she was also a cool lady and our favourite baby sitter. Her stories were fun and had lessons to be learnt. As such, we were constantly pestering her for more stories and I remember how she would tell us the story of the bag of sugar and the ants.
The Tale of the Bag of Sugar and the Ants
“After grocery shopping, a lady accidentally dropped a bag of sugar by the wayside. As it was too tedious to pick up all the little particles of sugar, she left it there unattended with the sugar spilling out of the bag.
Lo and behold, a huge family of ants found the sugar and laid claim to it at once. They began the arduous task of carrying their unexpected fortune back to their nest.”
The story would always end with my third aunt repeating this phrase non-stop:
“Piece by piece, the sugar was carried home by the hard working ants.”
Number 4 Aunt
My fourth aunt was a professional teacher and she was so good at it that she was promoted to be the Head Mistress of a prestigious boys school in the heart of Kuala Lumpur.
Successful and highly respected, she was also the president of the Chin Woo Women Association. As such, she was not considered to be a good candidate for marriage as ladies of those times were expected to become homemakers the minute they got married. So my fourth aunt remained a spinster until her death.
What did I remember most of her? It was when she volunteered to donate blood to the blood bank and the hospital found that her blood was contaminated. Priding her pristine state of virginity, my fourth aunt was very upset with the results and insisted that further tests be conducted. In those days, the technology was less advanced and blood tests took months and cost a great deal.
However, being a reputable “Government officer”, they had to oblige her. I will never know what her results were because, in order to appease her, the blood bank accepted her blood donation even before her test results were announced. Whether they really kept her blood or not will always remain a puzzle to me.
Number 5 Aunt
The youngest of the siblings, she was the jolliest one of them all and a fantastic drama queen. She had talent too — as far as I can remember, she could sing and dance and was an expert in “Tai Chi”.
She also had the best of life in the sense that she was a teacher and a homemaker. Of course she never achieved the position of Head Mistress.
She was also pretty heavy weight-wise. To deflect any criticism of her size, she would always make fun of herself first and her theme song, sung in Cantonese, went something like this in translation:
“Whoever says that I am fat, it is alright as I will give you a treat of chicken drumstick.”
She was fun to be with except during the later stages of her life when she suffered from dementia. Yet, when I visited her during those times, she still always had a smile on her face albeit a vacant one.
Through this journey of nostalgia, I am glad that I still vividly remember my paternal aunts with fondness and I still keep their gifts dearly. I guess these memories will go with me when I pass on as my children did not know them well. At least, they too have special memories with their own aunts to treasure.
This is life — when someone passes on, their memory is preserved until the ones with memories also leave this earth.
Please support us so that we can continue to bring you more Dharma:
If you are in the United States, please note that your offerings and contributions are tax deductible. ~ the tsemrinpoche.com blog team
Listening to the chanting of sacred words, melodies, mantras, sutras and prayers has a very powerful healing effect on our outer and inner environments. It clears the chakras, spiritual toxins, the paths where our ‘chi’ travels within our bodies for health as well as for clearing the mind. It is soothing and relaxing but at the same time invigorates us with positive energy. The sacred sounds invite positive beings to inhabit our environment, expels negative beings and brings the sound of growth to the land, animals, water and plants. Sacred chants bless all living beings on our land as well as inanimate objects. Do download and play while in traffic to relax, when you are about to sleep, during meditation, during stress or just anytime. Great to play for animals and children. Share with friends the blessing of a full Dorje Shugden puja performed at Kechara Forest Retreat by our puja department for the benefit of others. Tsem Rinpoche
Listen here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZbzgskLKxT8&t=5821s
This simple and sweet article brings back many sweet memories of our beloved grand parents who took care and brought us up. They were very kind,caring,loving, compassionate, understanding and my best friends! Best grand parents that we could ever find. I hope they have a good rebirth. Thank you very much Datuk May for sharing your short and interesting stories of your Aunts ????
Just when I thought the articles on the blog could not surprise me more, Datuk May you have come out with an article that tugs at the heart strings. Thank you for your writing, I really enjoyed this stories although its a quite short.
It just seems that stories from the distant past has a magical quality, that makes you totally immersed with it. Seems to me if you had wanted to write a book about your family, you can certainly do so.
My family most of my of the were professional, so they were a tad bit boring, the most interesting of the lot were those engaged in some form of business. Wish I had more people tell me stories when I was young. Stories can so enchanting, and my attraction to stories can be as much as Shahryār the Persian King who was enamoured with Scheherazade story telling and tales from, One Thousand and One Nights.
Reading this intersting nostalgia reminds me of my loved ones who has passed away. In fact I would like to yearn for the happiness of my loved ones. Both my paternal and maternal grandparents whom I have not met before had since passed many years back in China during the war before I was even born. I do know much about them as my parents never mention at all. What is gone is gone not even any memories. In the days ,weeks and years following the deaths of my parents , sister and brother in law, I never had to look far to tell a story. To me I tried not to share memories of family members who passed away as its too tragic and painful least talk about it. But deep inside me I always treasure those wonderful moments with them. Though our loved ones may be gone, we can keep their memory and legacy alive. I always tell my children, niece and nephews to live our life in a way that would make them proud. Letting go and look forward to a happy and meaningful life.
Thank you Datuk May for this interesting sharing of your nostalgia.
Recounting the stories of yours, reminded of my aunts and uncles from both sides of my parents as well. Each stories that you have dictated, my mind was having a snippets of how my aunts and uncles were when I was young. Some stories were from my own memory and while some were told by my siblings. Towards the end of your story, I caught myself taking a deep breath.
“This is life — when someone passes on, their memory is preserved until the ones with memories also leave this earth.”
Hence, those memories of mine will go off with me by the time I’m dead. Reminds me of the movie – CoCo by DisneyPixar recently. Thank you Datuk May for this NOSTALGIA .
*It reminds me of Ms.Han and Uncle Lai. Although I do not know them well but I’ve heard of them often.
If I can muster enough courage, perhaps I’ll take on nun’s vow even for a day in this lifetime. Just a thought but I believe it’s a positive thought. As the saying goes: Sadhu, sadhu, sadhu.
That is a nice thought to take on nun’s vow even for a day. Cherish this lovely thought and perhaps one day your dream will materialise.
Thank you ?
Thank you, Datuk May, for sharing of the memories of your departed relatives. Setting against the Great Gatsby era, where it is portrayed as a time of “the world is your oysters”, the stories of these five beautiful and talented sisters are really spellbinding. The stories lifted the curtain of imagination for me to the life of young ladies with dreams and ambitions! I really enjoyed reading them. 🙂
Thank you Datuk May for sharing about your fond memories of your aunts. Reading your article reminded me of my paternal and maternal grandmothers. My paternal grandmother passed away when I was in high school and my maternal grandmother passed away when I was around 9 years old.
I have very fond memories of them as they always showered us, their grandchildren with love and affection. During Chinese New Years, we would visit them and there would be loads of delicious Hubei food and snacks. They would play with us and we’d have a great time always.
As Datuk May wrote all these people have passed away and they will only be alive in our memories until we pass away. Our life will be a snippet of someone else’s memory after we pass away. And then all is gone.
So what’s the purpose of our life? As our teacher, Tsem Rinpoche says, it’s to benefit others always. Everything else will be self serving which leads to no where but self inflicted neurosis.