My great-grandfather died last night. He was ninety-one-years-old. I suppose our government's happy because he's one of the last few people they pay pension to. In Singapore, we don't have a a pension plan anymore, rather something we call a CPF. I have no idea what that means, and I don't really care. My great-grandfather used to be in the civil service, so he got all his medical and stuff free...
He's been mostly bedridden for the past couple of years... I'm old enough to remember him when he still could walk and talk somewhat. Once in a while, my whole family (great-uncles and -aunts, cousins, nieces, nephews... We're very extended family orientated, we Asians) would take him out for a nice dinner, and we'd have some goofy things going like karaeoke. That was always good fun. I don't remember him singing, though.
He's outlived his wife and one daughter, who died more than a year ago of stomach (was it colon?) cancer. I cried for Aunty Lucy, but I didn't really cry for him...
Most of what I know of him was told to me by my grandparents and father. Apparently he was quite a capable but hard and stingy man... I don't know if he is anything of a Scrooge, but sometimes the way he dealt with his sons make me think that he is that way. My two great-uncles (or granduncles, as we say back home) became estranged from their father over the years, and we don't even see the older of the two anymore.
At least my parents are home in Singapore at the moment. I wish I could be there, though. It's quite funny because I'm the oldest of the oldest of the oldest. My father was the oldest grandson and oldest son of my grandmother, who is the oldest child on the family. (Come to think of it, it sounds like something out of The Dark is Rising sequence. Good books, by the way.) The funeral is on Saturday. My parents say they'll cut out the obituary for my sister and me.
R.I.P.
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