人生是那么地渺小，人类是那么地脆弱。
人往往要在失去某样东西或情物， 才感叹过去的一切。
或许，这是我做人的失败，无法体会珍惜的意义，常以忙碌为借口，沉迷于自己的工作和个人的世界里，而忽略了和身边亲人增进情亲和友亲的机会。有人说，这是都市人的代价，我突然觉得，这只是个借口– 根本是个尝试以掩饰个人的惭愧和遗憾的借口。
对我而言，无论多少的反省和领悟，我的好友，好兄弟，已经离我而去。 这一切已成事实，也成为我终身的一个遗憾。
您的笑容，您那不屈不挠的精神， 不断地涌入我的脑海里。您那积极的人生哲学，和您那不苟的见解，常在我迷惑的时刻，给我一股奇妙的力量和指南。
刚才，我看着你，原本沉重的心， 被您安祥的睡眠感应， 突然间感觉飘飘然的。
现在，我仿佛着，望着您的背影，悄悄地在我的眼前消失。
永别了，我亲爱的朋友。
It was a Thursday morning, 8.30 a.m. pacific time, when I was cruising along 101 freeway to the SFO airport to catch my flight at 11 a.m. The journey was filled with a sense of anxiety, and I thought I was just anxious about not being able to catch the flight although I am still 3 hours away from the flight time, and the traffic wasn't heavy given that I had been cruising along at 80-100 mph. Never would I imagine my dear friend was battling for his life during that moment, at the other side of world.I thought everything went well, with me arriving at the airport ahead of time. It was a rough and choppy flight, “Just another choppy flight”, I silently mumbled to myself.
The plane landed at 12:20am, after a tiring and unusually long 7.5 hours of flight journey. I thought the day's ordeal is over, and I can finally spend some time with my wife.
*Beep* My mobile phone beeped furiously the moment I switched it on, just after I came down from the plane. “It must be Yeez SMS'ing me about her arrival to receive me at the airport”, I told myself. Along with these SMS messages that she sent, came a rather unfamiliar message from Raymond. Surely he knew I am still travelling, and will not have sent me a message for a TPY GTG, which in anycase, it'as a long while since I went with him and the folks.
My heart sank when I read his message.
He has gone. My dear friend who has been an inspirational figure and encouraging friend in my life for the past three years since we first met, could not overcome the power of the virus, and has left with the lord while I was riding on the choppy flight.
Suddenly, my eyes burst into tears, quietly.
This can't be real, I still could not believe what's in the SMS. From the time he was first diagnosed of the fearful illness, he had never shown any sign of defeat nor resignation. He was a brave and courageous man, and thoughtful too, for not wanting his wife and his surrounding friends to worry too much about his condition. Even as he was fighting his own battle, he had never stopped encouraging and counselling people around him, including yours truly. His candid response and opinion is, has always been, and will always be, a form of strength and a source of light to me.
For somebody who braved through numerous times of chemotherapy, constantly seeking other medication alternatives and staying positive all the time, he has my upmost respect. Where he can stay positive all the time, then I should feel ashame of myself for letting work pressure overcome me so easily.
“I have to pay my last respect to him … now “, as I was crusing back home. After a quick wash up, I speed off with Yeez again, to his wake. It was a sober journey, occassionally linger with some rattling noise that would have annoyed me in the normal days. But that night, the ride seemed rather quiet.
It was about 2a.m. when we reached his wake. The footsteps to the pavilion where the wake was held, were rather heavy. A familiar photo appeared right in front of us, and our hearts sank further. While holding the joss-sticks, my teary eyes cried again. Yeez couldn't control her emotion and cried quietly. Looking at his serene and tranquil face, I feel there's an inner peace in him as he left earlier. We finally broke down, but decided to compose ourselves after a couple of minute, and bid him farewell.
Before we left, I steathily prayed, “Your modding spirit and our friendship will always be in my heart, do rest in peace”
His beloved Bora in 2002
Zenyee.com was initiated in 2002, to document all the car modification information. Year 2002 was a crazy year for my wife, Yee, and myself, particularly on the way how we non-stop modify our VW ride after owning it for a year. (yes! it's we, not just myself!) It's also the year where we started to get in touch with fellow Veedubbers, folks from the VW community.
Prior to Zenyee.com, there has been many attempt to create my own personal site. Not that I am not technically inclined, nor I lack of art gene (if you allow me to be bullish about it) to design a pleasant looking web site. An individual site, is almost like a commercial site, it needs alot of follow up activities to keep the site relevant. It needs alot of perseverance to keep the site running, instead of losing the interest after a month of effort.
Not that a personal site like Zenyee.com needs to stay relevant to keep the traffic coming, and to service its readers. A personal site, is afterall, personal. It needs not care about how others feel about the content relevancy or whether they are excited or interested about the content. Still, it need to stay relevant, particularly with regards to time. Zenyee.com, like most successful personal sites I presume, is like a cyber diary to Yee and myself. While there are at times moments of inner thoughts that we want to keep in privacy, there are alot of times, we just want to pen down our thoughts, and share with our family and friends because we think it's essential part of our harmony socialisation.
Anyhow, enough of chanting, let this be start of more thought-provoking articles to be shared. In the meantime, one thing for sure, the car mod page and content will continue to flood in, just couldn't come to terms with the thought that a car is just a transport!
Happy New Year!
