ASMA HAMID

I was never really close to my Pak Tok growing up, that may be because I only spent a little part of my childhood with him. But I've always looked up to him, I admired him from afar. I never told anyone but I used to get jealous when I see my cousins have conversations with him and mess about with him because it's something that I wasn't capable of doing. However, I did have random small chats with him sometimes but they were never really proper deep conversations... because of how uncomfortable I was at speaking in Malay. But I still remember them so that's nice. Bet you didn't know that I started wearing my scarf properly because of him. This one time, I drank too much and too fast, he said that my cup was leaking because my drink was gone too quick. He used to also playfully hit me for fun because I'm mengada and would overreact. Bet he wished that we were proper close too.  To make up for all the time that I didn't get to spend with my grandpar...

Coming here, I knew that I would miss birthdays, weddings and celebrations. I expected them and I came to accept them. What I recently only came to realise is that I would also miss being there for my family and friends when they need me. Recently, Mak was admitted to the hospital and the fact that I couldn't be there to visit her and support her pained me so much. My grandaunt also just passed away but I was unable to at least go to her funeral. And just a few days back, my best friend had to go through something unimaginable. Through all these events that happened in the past month, I realised that the most I could do was text those people. And that was it. It pains me so much that I know how much they're hurting and I know how much I'm needed but there's nothing that I could do about it. J, I don't know how it feels. But I know that you're strong. The fact that you're keeping yourself together through those fake smiles, fake laughs and fake happi...