You will be missed

Dearest popo,

I'm sorry I couldn't be there today to see you one last time. I know that if I were, I'd be sobbing my eyes out right now.

I will always remember the little antiques that you like to pull, acts that we see as such, from such an amusing and loving gramdnother that not everyone (except us) got to know.

About how you wouldn't eat your rice without salted fish.

Or how the food wasn't salty (or sweet) enough.

Or when you made funny faces when we tried to get you to take your medicine.

And your amazing kopi-o, you had a recipe for it. A spoonful of sugar short and you wouldn't touch a drop.

This we all knew, all your children (yep, 11 of them), and all your grandchildren (too many to count).

But we also know that you loved us all, even though we can be really really noisy in your house, or even if we were whispering (you'd be able to hear cause of your superb hearing), you still like us hanging around doing nothing, just so we could be with each other, as a family.

But hey, you were a cool granny too! I remember when our parents used to say to us about how we shouldn't go out so often or what we should or shouldn't do when we were going to go out with friends, you'd sneak us cousins a 50bucks each just before we left. And you joke around with our friends. And you say silly things just to make us laugh.

You were the stronghold of the family. Every Sunday after mass, all of us would gather at your place, just hang around, gossip a bit, eat loads of fruits, stay there for lunch till you were tired and gone to take a nap.

Then there was the Chinese New Year dinner / your birthday. Massive massive celebration, lots and lots of food. Loads of laughter. One I haven't been able to see in any other family. Not one. Not even close.

With you gone, things will never be the same.

But I'm glad to know that you were happy to have all your children come back to see you. And I know that you cried when one after the other, each of them left, because you knew that that would be the very last time you would get to see them on earth.

And I thank God from the bottom of my heart that I made that very unexpected trip back home just to see you, very much smiling and as stubborn as always, but God knows you cannot be replaced, and we will miss you always.