The inevitable of life

Last night I went with my sis to a friend's place for memorial prayers for his father who passed away last week after a battle with colon cancer. It's strange that I was prepared for a solemn crowd and less merry-making... but everything was vice-versa... when we reached the house, I could hear laughter and people talking loudly and there were many gestures shared among the clusters or cliques of people aggregating like a high school reunion... Why didn't I expect it? I guess it was the same when my grandma passed away? I think it was because I felt that losing a father at 18 was more traumatic than losing a 88-year-old grandma at 23. Or maybe I'm not just the only one who's stoic to so many passages of life... death, after all is one of the inevitables of life.

When I met Alvin's mum, my reflex was to give her a big bear hug, which she replied by an even bigger bear hug! I was so impressed by the strength the petite lady was exhibiting! Alvin was still no way in sight, so my sis and I proceeded to to the living room of the house where some people (I presumed Christians...) were already assembling in front of an altar holding small prayer books and at the corner of the house, 2 men carrying guitars, waiting for the cue to start strumming...

The rosary prayer and the singing of hymns were beautiful! Then the priest blessed the family and the house... the only strange thing was he said quite an unusual prayer (to me...) about "casting all that is not You from the house...", "keep the house holy..." Maybe I just haven't attended many memorial prayers in my lifetime... I thought the prayers should have been more directed to the soul of the deceased and also for the family... but it seemed that it was more for casting out evil spirits... but anyways, everybody looked happy and relieved (because it was the last night, 7th night) after the prayers and everybody proceeded for a little fellowship (makan)... but my sis and I left before that because she had to rush to a meeting and I had to rush home. But we managed to give Alvin a hug each before leaving. He even had the time to said that he liked my fringe! :) I've not seen him in 2 months I think before this.

Yesterday wasn't a very productive day for me... I apparently spent the whole day revising, but at the end of the day, I only covered 3-4 topics! Because like I mentioned before, medicine is just like that... the more we read, the more would come to light, warranting further reading... so I concentrated more on basics yesterday because I guess that's generally my weakness... the doctors would ask a lot of "high-tech" questions to the students and most can answer, but when it comes to basic physiology, anatomy amd pathophysiology, our weaknesses shine through...

And last night I decided not to continue my revision after coming back from Alvin's place... instead I watched "Double Vision" on AXN and New Detective on Discovery Channel... not bad... especially the New Detective... the theme last night was "Justice favours the innocent"... all 3 cases were examples very late convictions because of lack of evidence, and the breakthrough of forensic technology a decade later finally bringing the perpetrators to justice... DNA, ballistics, blood splatter patterns... amazing! It is moments like this that really inspire me to pursue forensics...

So after this I'll attempt to continue my revision, then later my mum actually asked me to join her and her friends for high-tea at some hotel... I'm still considering... I may want to attend mass this evening... let's see where the tides bring me today... hahah!

To all my collegues, happy studying!

Cheers!