Is it the time of the year or me? I seem to be recalling a lot of old forgotten incidents and people this week. This rainy Sat afternoon, it was the boy who used to go to my paternal grandmother's place.
This grandmother loved me a lot and often brought me to her place to stay for a few days every other week, for she lived alone in a big house as housekeeper for a Chinese clan association who met there.
But I didn't like it; there was nothing to play with apart from a small wind-up car - I wasn't too in love with it - and dough figurines, which I didn't have often enough. There were no cousins near my age. In fact, the whole house was empty but for me and grandmother.
I couldn't run about cos the house was huge enough for a little girl to get lost, and it was dangerous too as the house was on a busy road. Grandmother kept three big dogs in the field behind the back quarters but they were not the friendly kind. I didn't like the parrot much cos it was squawking all the time and refused to talk like parrots did on TV. The lone cat was, well, a loner and ignored me. Grown chickens were also not much fun, and they got slaughtered too often :p
Side: I was once given two cute little chicks as pets, which Mother kept in a box in the flat. They were really noisy when grown and one day they were gone. Couple of years back, I happened to think of my chicks and asked Mother where they went to. "Your grandmother slaughtered them for chicken curry. In fact, you ate too." o_O
But sometimes, a boy would come by with his mother or grandmother, from somewhere down the road. I thought he was older than me cos he was taller. We would play quietly with dough or the car while the elders talked. We never talked. Perhaps he was shy as I was..?
When we were allowed, or when the adults weren't looking, we would play in the main hall of the house. Everything there was black; the many grandfather clocks lining both lengths of the room, the huge long table in the middle and its matching chairs. I remember sitting on the table top playing with the car. But we usually ran around the table playing catch or something. And all this time, we never talked. In my memory, we were always silent..
I didn't like the house very much, too dark, too boring, too many mosquitoes. But I liked my time there when the boy visited. Unfortunately, the visits were not too frequent and all too soon, I saw him no more =( Perhaps he had to go to school. I too had to attend kindergarten after a while and went to the house much less often.
Few photos were taken back then, and I couldn't find any of the boy in the old photo albums. But I was delighted to discover one with my puppy, which my grandmother kept and which enticed me to visit her often even after I started school:
I think the whole family visited her every week or fortnight but I don't recall the boy ever visiting while all of us were there. My grandmother is totally senile and can't remember anything now. No one else seems to know anything about the boy. Despite being my most valuable playmate in my early years, he will be a total stranger to me today. Whoever and wherever he is, I thank him for his company, and I wish him well..
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