Editor’s Note:
This In-Between post is a personal reflection on grief, family, and the people who shape us. At Mama’s Here, every story looks different. Some are about motherhood in the way we usually understand it, some are about the love, values, and memories that form the families we go on to build. As always, the only thing we all share is that we are trying our best with what we know.
It was just an ordinary Thursday, starting with the usual morning school run, followed by a pickup, and a few errands to check off the list before the end of the day. I was at my parents’ place with my husband and brother, helping move furniture around and to de-clutter, while planning the upcoming end-of-month activities with my parents since my daughter will be on school holidays. A few productive hours in, my mother received a video call from her sisters, making that Thursday the one I will always remember.
“I think you guys should come to the house. Now.”
At that moment we became quiet. In fact, I’m pretty sure we didn’t move.
“What happened exactly?” we asked.
Without going into too much detail, my 93-year-old grandmother, the matriarch of my mom’s side of the family, was coming close to the end of her life. We didn’t really know it at the time, but we sensed the urgency from what had transpired. Not long after that, the text message came in to the family chat group, summoning everyone: her 5 daughters, 5 sons-in-law, 19 grandchildren, 10 grandchildren-in-law, and 5 great-grandchildren, who all turned up. This was no ordinary Thursday. Later that evening, she passed away peacefully, surrounded by her whole family.
After she passed, we told our granddad, and all he said was, “I had been married for a very long time.” It was indeed a long time; it would have been 69 years this year. When we took him to see her before prayers, he teared knowing full well that he had just lost his best friend, his wife.
It had taken me a while to pen this down. In fact, as I was actually halfway through writing this article, and in the midst of grieving for the loss of our grandmother, our grandfather, aged 91, was admitted to the hospital a week after her death. Initially, he seemed to have recovered slightly, only for it to take a turn for the worse and once again, the family was summoned. He passed away on that Monday morning. And as fate had decided, they were both laid to rest next to each other. Talk about being meant to be in this life and the next.
My purpose for writing this is to give myself space to mourn and to celebrate the lives that shaped mine. We didn’t just love them because they were our grandparents; we loved them because of who they were as people. They both led such full, incredible lives, who had the best stories to share, were always up for a laugh or a song, and they cared very much about their family, all 44 of us (not including their siblings, nieces and nephews). Clearly, we come from a pretty massive family. And it wasn’t until my cousin-in-law Yasmine said, “You know, without Tok Man and Tok Zain, none of us would be here”. It was what she said that inspired me to write. So here I am, sharing a story about my grandparents.
My grandmother, was a force of nature of a woman, and growing up, she was very loving and caring, yet she was quite strict with us. But honestly, what do you expect? She was one of the eldest of 18 children; she was a Headmistress and a sports teacher, and at some point in her life when she lived in New Zealand with my grandad (he was an Education Attaché for the Malaysian Students Department there), she used to host many dinners for students who would go over to visit their house.
It’s no wonder that what we experienced from her when we were growing up was that everything had to be clean, in order, and whenever people wanted to drop by, she would always ask, “How many people are we expecting, and what are we preparing for them to eat?”
She cooked some of the most memorable dishes that I will miss greatly, and imparted the best cooking advice I still live by that is also meant to be applied to life. She would say…
“Kita buat dia, bukan dia buat kita.” Which sums up to be, don’t worry. Because we make it, it doesn’t make us.
She spent a lot of time completing search puzzle books, and she ADORED singing. In her youth, she was a Radio Singapore singer, and best believe, her love for music had been passed down to her daughters and grandchildren, as we enjoy bursting into song in every single opportunity. She also really loved watching my cousins perform when they sang together as a band.
Music was also a shared passion with my grandfather, as they made it a point to have us listen to the radio, particularly Keroncong music in the evenings as they both hummed and sang together to wind down for the day.
My grandad, whom I always called the Number 3 man in my life, was always so chatty. He used to share his adventures as a young man, from his Boy Scouts days, his hitchhiking stints, his favourite finds in the Reader’s Digest and the encyclopaedia, and little unexpected things he noticed on a daily basis. One of my favourites was when he counted the number of times the neighbour’s peacock (yes, an actual peacock) would *call. He said it was 5 times.
*That’s literally what the sound peacocks make are called!
We loved to joke that one of his favourite pastimes was napping before we sat at the dining room for some tea and snacks. He taught himself to play the piano and the guitar, and taught us not to take life too seriously.
They were both people of faith, and as Muslims, they taught us to always trust in God, to look at life as glass half full, to treat people with honesty and kindness, and to do good to others without expecting anything in return.
They both had a lot of love and respect for each other, were eloquent and fantastic communicators, and made it a point to always be a student of life. They were, to everyone, the ultimate couple goals. How they saw and treated each other is something so hard to come by these days. Their passing away just 11 days apart from each other just shows how close their relationship was.
I know Mama’s Here is a channel that shares open and honest stories about motherhood, and while this might not seem like it, I feel the need to share this personal experience, as these are the two people that really set the foundation for all of our families. And now that I have my own, there were so many amazing bits of habits and wisdom from their lives that I would proudly impart to my family. It wouldn’t matter to me if it seemed old-fashioned, because we knew exactly who they were. They were GOOD people, and they really LIVED.
I could spend hours talking about how incredible they were, how much we will miss them, and how big a loss it is not only for their daughters but for everyone who had crossed paths with them. Death will always be a reminder for the living, and I am eternally grateful to have had them. As they lay in their final resting place, their memories live on in every teatime, every search puzzle, every nap, and every time we listen to Keroncong music.
Al-Fatihah to my grandparents, Hj Othman Dahlan and Hjh Zain Sheikh Mansore.