Besides his jokes, his easy going ways and his mahjong, I
remember my dad’s next favourite to do things, taking me for a walk.
I had many walks with my dad ever since I can remember. Till the
last days in his life, I had walks with my dad. Each walk with dad was
different, each has a different purpose. Broadly I categorised my walks with my
dad into five stages.
My dad started with the silent walk, and this took place
when I was very young, he usually just took my hands or called me and say, “Let’s
take a walk.” And we walk around my old housing estate of Jalan Brockman, Camay
Park, Pasir Puteh, Ipoh. I must be around 5 to 8 years old. In those years I
had many silent walks, my dad does play with me and sisters, but he was usually
not talkative with me.
He was a businessman, making and selling dim sum for a
living. He started in the business with my late grandfather. My family used to
have a few restaurants but as time went by, many of the shops were sold as the seniors passed on and the money gotten was distributed. Dad worked hard and
long hours, he usually rests once a year. So, whenever he had time, he will
take me out for a walk. The walk may be silent, but dad’s presence was not. Each
silent walk reminds me how important I am in his life.
Very often the presence far outweighs words.
The next stage, I would call the showing walk. In these
walks, my dad tends to show me what to say and what to do when meeting people
in different places. I love this showing walks. Here, I will follow him out to
the shop where he made his dim sum at 490, Jalan Pasir Puteh, Ipoh. The shop itself
has an interesting history. It was once belonged to my grandfather, later he willed
it to my dad. It was a long double storey shop house with three rooms upstairs
where dad’s two elder brothers and families lived. The early agreement was that
the brothers were to pay for the utilities but somehow the brothers who were
less affluent than my dad did not do so. My dad got fed up and sold the shop to
a friend and then got his brothers to rent the shop back from the friend.
Family dynamics were everywhere.
I loved this part because here I get to meet all my dad’s
friends and their interesting, vulgar and expletive filled conversations and
stories. My dad will tell me to greet this uncle and that aunty. I will say good
morning. Over time those uncles also played mahjong with dad and they called my
dad ‘Sei Ngan Chai’ , directly translated ‘four eyes guy’ which was nickname
for those with spectacles.
One uncle Keng told me to call my dad ‘old snake’,
which I happily did. And my dad asked me to call uncle Keng ‘Pai Kah Chai’ or a spendthrift, but it sounded really bad in Cantonese. I happily called
uncle Keng, Pai Kah Chai. When one is young, you can virtually get away with
anything.
During this showing walk I learned how to drink and smoke.
Okay dad did allow me to try both. I discovered I hated cigarette. Dad told me
to light a cigarette for him, dad smoked. I happily did it and the coffee shop
owner gladly passed me one cigarette, those days cigarette can be sold by
stick. I put it in my mouth like dad, I lit like dad, I inhaled like dad, and
I coughed, choked and my face turned blue, not like dad.
As for alcohol, dad let me drank a few pints of beer once
during a free buffet meal. I was thirsty and since beer was free I had three. I
was drunk and what discouraged me from drinking was I had rashes all over including
parts that my hands cannot reached.
Dad liked to take me for a showing walk near our stalls
which was located opposite the now burnt down Capitol cinema and on the
verandah of the now famous Ipoh Salted Chicken shop. Yes , I knew the owner of
the shop. Now the story of this Inn Kheng Lim salted chicken shop was that the successful
boss was the most useless of all children. He did not know what to do with his
life and always walking in and out of the shop. But one day during his travel
he discovered the salted chicken recipe and rest as they say is history.
Back to my showing walk, my dad will walk straight to the Teochew
porridge stall in Yau Tet Shin street. Dad will go straight to the salted fish
jar and will take two pieces of Kurau salted fish, each the size of two chicken
nuggets, for me and for him. We will both eat the salted fish like snacks, like
your potato chips today. We then walked to the pasar malam or night market
just to walk around and see how other businesses were doing. Dad will show me
how other peopleweree also working hard for a living. He told me this as he gestured
to the night market stalls;
”There is nothing wrong with what
they are doing, working hard is part of life. You don’t need to follow dad and
be a maker and seller of dim sum. You can do other things. But you should learn
how to do dim sum because this skill is like a blanket in the winter, it can
keep you warm.”
I never forget these words. This showing walk lasted until
my early teens.
As I reached my mid and late teens, dad took me for another
type of walk which, I called the teaching walk. This was when he started taking
me out for evening walks and he will tell me stories. Stories about how he came
to Malaysia, stories of him working in tin mines and got cheated by the employer, stories of him swimming
across mining pool with bunched watermelons as floats. He later told me stories
of how he lost the shop, how his brothers depended on him to pay for their
weddings. And how his own brother betrayed his trust and stole money from the
business.
I asked him once, “Aren’t you angry with your brothers for
all theses things to you again and again?” My dad replied, “They are still my
brothers. Friends I can choose, brothers I cannot.” From that I knew my dad’s
stands when it comes to family.
My dad told me a story of how he lost our semi-detached
house in Camay Park. It was because my mom’s eldest brother needed an immediate
loan to pay an Ah Long who escorted my Uncle back from Singapore to collect his
gambling debt. After taking a loan from a sikh money lender my dad business also suffered and eventually
had to sell our beautiful house. My dad never told my mom why he had to take a
loan and my mom’s mind conjured some nasty ideas of him gambling or worse, having a mistress, which, was common those days.
During this teaching walk, dad will tell me stories about him
dating mom and how a man should treat a woman. He even told me that a man must
take all responsibilities, whether it was my doing or not, as long as I am the
head of a family or at work, we must take responsibilities for everything.
Dad taught me that money is important not the most important
thing in life. Money was never for us to keep but to be used for better good.
The next walk I would call the friendship walk. After my
returned from England in 1993, I had many such walks with my dad not as father
and son but as friends. As usual my dad is not very talkative. We will walk
around our house in Taman SPPK, Pasir Puteh, Ipoh. We will talk about the
changes in the area and what was good to eat.
By then I was working in Kuala Lumpur and dad sometimes come
out to stay with me in Klang. We always walked to the coffee shop near my house
in Taman Berkeley , Klang. By then my dad was no longer working. We don’t talk
much but just walk, like when I was young.
Very often silence was golden and it spoke volume.
The last stage is what I would term a gratifying walk. Every
moment I could walk with him and take him out for dim sum and Chinese tea or to
a coffee shop for his favourite Cham Glass Besar or coffee and tea mixed
beverages was precious.
Again not much words just precious silent moments.
Probably the most gratifying walk was when I took him back to China,
specifically to his home town Panyu in Guangzhou on 8 Dec 2008. My dad 's face lit up when he
saw his old village which, was more like a town than village. He left that place in 1937. He never thought he could go back before he dies.
I can still recalled my dad’s joyous cheerful smile as he
walked the streets of Guangdong with his hands holding a bowl of hot beef
tripes or the moment he ate sugar cane the old fashion way. He even taught my
children how to eat sugar cane the old fashion way.
Those moments on his face are carved into my mind like it
was just yesterday. But my dad’s greatest joy was when he saw my younger
brother getting married in 2012. Now my brother was a source of dad’s penultimate
worry. This younger brother of mine had many ups and downs in his life ad my
dad was worried that he will suffer in life. But all that changed when my
brother landed a good job and found a wife. Dad's joy was compounded when my brother became a father. In dad's mind, my brother's life and success was sealed.
During this last walk, my dad talked more than usual, he was
actually sharing his feelings which, was not that evident in my earlier walks.
He told me his worry for my brother and he also told me that he was concerned
that no one can live with my mom if he dies first. He told me that he hoped
that my mom will go first, read my earlier post about my
mom.(click on the linked word).
In this last walk, I was gratified that my dad was there to teach
me that as parents we will always worry for our children and as a husband we
will always worry for our spouse.
I developed this let’s take a walk philosophy from my dad. Till
these days I like to take my spouse, my children, my friends and staff for a
walk. It could be a silent walk, a showing walk, a teaching walk, a friendly walk
or a gratifying walk. It does not matter which types of walk, there is always a
lesson to be learned, a relationship waiting to be built.
