Its Been 2 Months Already

I was tinkering with the music player of my phone when I found a track that read Track 4 - Unknown. I played the track and the familiar sound of Carlos Santana's solo on Black Magic Woman suddenly arrested my attention. The first thing that I could visualise was my late brother with a microphone in hand and eyes closed. His thick long curly hydrogen peroxide bleached locks were blowing in the wind and fans were screaming.

Yes, my late brother was a singer and he was pretty good. He was also good with the guitar but not good enough to be a permanently featured guitarist. When he was younger he was one hell of a looker and may I add a Casanova. He was many times mistaken for a Mat Salleh for he had no Malay feature at all. Only when he opened his mouth would his race be revealed. Oh how I wish I am the kind who collects photographs.

Yesterday was exactly 2 months to the day my late brother left us and I can't help thinking of him. I just came back from Raden's blog and she was talking about her late mother in law and it reminded me of my late brother more. Just a few minutes ago I received two empty sms from my late brother's number. I called back and my niece apologised. She said that Masha, my grandniece, my late brother's only grandchild, was playing around with the phone.

I still see him when I am alone. I see his smiles and I see us talking together. I remember how he used to tell me stories about his work and exploits in his younger days. I remember the dinners he used to take my family and I for whenever we visited. I remember his fondness for mutton and how whenever we visited, mutton is a must for lunch. He loved to dine and money was no object when food was concerned.

For someone with only a decent result in his MCE, he sure worked his way up the ladder. He joined a Hong Kong based factory in Prai as a trainee technician and was sent to Hong Kong for a 3 month training stint. From then on he worked his way up. When the Japanese bought over the company his rise was more meteoric. He was already a manager in his 30s. Then he went to Matsushita where he ended up a General Manager for one of the departments.

What gave him the edge was his work ethics. He was completely different from. I do at times take mc just to rest. Whenever I fell sick, I would definitely get an mc. He on the hand had never taken an mc for about 25 years before he retired but in those times he had been warded quite a number of times and had surgery once. How did he do it? He took his annual leave. Even when he was hospitalised, he would use up his annual leave and never the mc given. I remember when he had surgery for hernia, he left for work the very next day despite being ordered by the doctors to rest.

As far as work ethics was concerned, he was a carbon copy of my late father. I can't remember my father taking more then a day off at a time. I don't think it is any wonder that they were similar coz amongst us siblings, he was the one who had the most Pakistani feature. My second brother do look Pakistani but the Malay in him do show. My sister and I on the other hand have the most Malay feature. We take after our mother a lot.

My late brother died exactly 29 years and 1 day after my father. They both had liver cancer with my brother outdoing my late father with an additional complication, that is liver cancer. Both died with only 1 grandchild and both died relatively young. Whatever the memory is, I still think of him.