a tribute to grandma

was on facebook earlier and a bunch of people have been commenting on this guy's note and i thought i'd give it a looksee. possibly one of the best things i've read in a while, the tone is the epitome of what a eulogy should be. breaks my heart:

"a spectacular woman born months after World War I, who has endured more suffering and grief throughout her life than most people ever will, yet has been positive throughout and has lived until now, 91 years later.

the 'lucky' lady married a physician fresh out of HKU and had two kids..but little did she know, 4 years later, World War II would begin, the Japanese would invade, supplies to her village would be cut off, and she would lose her husband, youngest son, and many other family members to starvation. what good is a physician with no food and no farm?

flee she did, hunkering in limbo until her father-in-law in South America was finally able to get Britain to approve her move to Guyana, to start life anew with her surviving child.

who knew that years later Guyana would also be a place of violence, poverty, crime, and hardship?

despite warnings from my great-great-grandfather that Canada was a terrible place and Chinese get treated like shit (he worked on the railroad in BC much earlier on..), flee we did, scoping out multiple Canadian cities until we ended up in Vancouver.. hoping that the third continent would be the one to last.

over the years in Canada she would help raise my siblings, as my parents worked 7 days a week 365 days a year. not only did she do that, but she helped care for some of my cousins on my mom's side as well. totallly voluntary, and totally unrelated to her. but she did.

she was the most frugal person i've ever met. she re-used disposable styrofoam plates for years, never bought her own tissues/napkins(etc.) (that's what condiment stands are for), ate rotting/moldy food (but never got sick..), and pretty much never bought anything for herself. but she bought me toys when i was little, she took me to eat at McDonalds, she funded my grade 10 exchange to Japan when i failed at saving enough money and still selfishly insisted on going, despite our family's dire financial situation.
she has always been encouraging and supportive of me.

she looked after me when my parents weren't around. rushed me to the doctor the one and only time i had anaphylaxis. taught me how to make noodles and dumplings from scratch. she took me out to go places, took me to Whistler, to the Gulf Islands, to places my parents never took me.

she was a simple woman, made happy by food (esp all you can eat sushi), gardening, walking, socializing with friends. she was made happy by her grandkids getting married (..except me), and by her 4 great-grandchildren.

She had Parkinson's Disease for years but has always been positive about it, and never let it stop her in doing all the activities that she enjoyed. She lived independently till age 90 and never asked people for help. she didn't want to bother us.

then all of a sudden WHAM kidney failure. WHAM heart failure. WHAM stroke. WHAM pneumonia. WHAM Clostridium Difficile and toxic megacolon.
watching her suffer in the past little while has been so tough. for a woman who never complained about anything to keep repeating the words "i'm in pain, i'm in pain" makes your heart wrench.
and when she wasn't able to talk anymore, the look in her eyes told me everything. during the entire ordeal, she was able to smile once, and once only.

she knew her time was coming but it didn't come. her body kept wanting to hold on. finally, this weekend, she left us.

i miss her a lot, and i always will, but i take solace in the fact that she is no longer suffering.

if she wasn't so strong and wasn't able to make it through all the hard times, i wouldn't be here today.

here's to grandma"