Feel like getting my parents to leave for Melbourne earlier. The haze is quite bad and they are not really young anymore. I still remembered my grandma, my uncle was rushing her back to Hong Kong which at that time had the worse pollution. She passed away after a pneumonia attack. Honestly I still blamed my uncle, but knowing how filial, really can’t say much.

Kinda missed my grandma. At that time I don’t have much money, whatever money wasn’t enough to handle the Asian Financial Crisis. My brother had just started his own company. All depends on my engineer salary and my budding business start ups. My grandma loved durians, everytime I got some of the cheap ones, she always scolded me for spending money. I got a D24 for her, she loved it but kept nagging me for spending the money for a long time. I remembered the worse case was when I got her a bowl of abalone noodles. That won a record breaking nagging from her. But I am glad that I gave her whatever I could, at that time those tiny things meant a lot. At least I did what I could when she was with us. But now, I could have got her an entire durian plantation. Abalone? They came as gifts in boxes of dozens. But she is no longer around.

Singapore’s haze getting bad, I don’t want to take a single chance, rather my parents flew to Melbourne which is our second home anyway. My nephews are there to keep them company. I remembered something my uncle never cried during my grandma’s funeral. I think his heart was broken then, he was so filial but he was the sort who would never shed a tear, which is extremely bad for health. I thought I am something like him. But I could not control myself and broke down crying. I think my grandma would be happy knowing that we had done well. She suffered so much, being widowed at such a young age and taking care of her children. She had very strong character, when she went for her cancer surgery which was really a major surgery, what she told my mom was, if anything happen, the money was at where, where she can get food etc and just went herself to the hospital for the major surgery. No one knew. She survived, and when my uncle made his fortune, he brought her basically around the world where he did his businesses. It was only during the Asian Financial Crisis that she came back to be with us for a while. I was her favorite grandson, though the most naughty and rebellious. I am glad I went through those nightmarish times to help my uncle recover from the crisis. I remembered those relatives closest to ask us telling my mother that she was destroying her sons by allowing us to help our uncle. Honestly worse come, I am bankrupt forever, nothing much. When she passed away, she had the comfort of knowing that my uncle was up in his feet again and I am proud that I helped him staking my entire life fortune on this.

I am just worried about my uncle, his businesses is too complicated dealing with those unsavory characters. I just hope he can retire soon and maybe live with us in Melbourne. My nephews will be crazy if my parents go at this time. Especially the younger one will be showing off the Ipad I got for him. Thinking of donating some to his parochial school, I find the Ipad very useful for kids learning. Maybe will sound them out to see what are their actual requirements.