I had always thought about it and mentally prepared myself for this, but in fact, no amount of mental preparation has helped to lessen my grief.
My grandmother passed away on 29th Jan 2014... 1 day before our Reunion Dinner, 1 day before eve of Chinese New Year. She passed away on the day we were going back to Malaysia, and we didn't make it in time to see her for the last time. She suffered a mild stroke on that Friday. Everyone thought that she would recover, even the doctor said so. She could be discharged a few days after but her blood pressure and sugar level was high thus the doctor recommended not to discharged her first. We were expecting her to be discharged from the hospital on the day we were going back, but her condition turned for the worst suddenly on the very same day. She suffered a second stroke in the afternoon and slipped into coma from then onwards...
The news came when we were about 2 hours away from Ipoh and my heart turned cold the moment I heard the news. My aunt kept calling us to check our location as she said that the staff wanted to move her to the mortuary already. When we reached the hospital, we saw that she was already being wrapped up. My uncle unwrapped it and let us see her for the last time. All blood seemed to have drained from her face and made it turned yellowish. That totally didn't look like the grandma I had always known.
That night, my siblings and I went to my cousin's house to sleep over for the night. Although I was very tired, it still took me quite long to fall asleep. Memories with her kept on coming back. I'd try to distract myself from it but it didn't work. The phone conversation we had 2 weeks before she passed away also kept repeating in my mind.
Our phone conversation was something along this line (we conversed in Hakka and it's impossible to direct translate it, so I just put it into a more comprehensible form):
Grandma: 阿婆没用了咯，现在走一下就觉得累，累了又去睡一下。
Me: 那你走累了去休息也好啊，起码有做点运动，好过一直躺着。你觉得累了就要休息。
Grandma: 对咯，在老屋的时候我收拾一点，累了就到房里睡，睡醒了又继续收拾。
Me: 是咯，这样好嘛。。你慢慢一点一点做, 到我们回去就刚刚好。
Grandma: 那你们几时回？
Me: 星期3。那天我有上课，下午放课后就回去了。。
Grandma: 哦，那好。。 就这样咯。
Me:喔，byebye, 你早点睡。
That was just a normal conversation we had almost every other month, but I didn't expect it to be the last...
Recalling everything about her and typing this post still hurts..but I will still continue to post more though... I want to use this to note down as much things as possible so that when I look back in the future, I will still remember the times we had together.
...Not being able to see her for the last time before she passed away will always remain as a regret for the rest of my life...
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