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Dear
Lai Min,
Chek Jawa days are just full. Remember that windy and sultry day?
I led you by the hand through the woods. You appeared hesitant at
first. I had your hand in mine, and gave you a squeeze to tell you
I was near. Two lonely figures we were, in a tunnel of trees and shrubs,
walking upon the soft and winding trail. It might rain, they said,
but I was undaunted. |
| The
sea was near. We stopped momentarily to look up at the rustling of
the leaves and felt the breeze in our faces. ‘That’s the wind’, I
said. ‘And that’s the sea too!’ I added in jubilation. No sooner,
the glaring shimmer of the sea broke through the gaps in the woods
like a chandelier of lights caught in the wind. We quicken our steps
and gingerly picked our way among the rocks and boulders on the rugged
shore. |
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| And there
you were, bubbling with excitement. You took fancy in almost every
piece of broken corals and pebbles. If only you could see the twinkle
in your own eyes and the quiet joy in a father’s heart. For a moment
in time, I felt immortality and that we could walk on and on till
time eternal. Did you not feel the desolate vastness of the sandflat
beneath our feet and the sky above our heads? Would you remember the
warmth of a father’s care when I pulled your socks off so that you
could stand in the pools left by the receding sea? |
You
ran around pointing out all the starfishes you could find and asked
in the most natural way if you could keep one in the fish tank at
home. I laughed. It better they stay in the sea, I said. You held
one for a moment in your small palm and then let it go. Time could
only be counted in sea anemones, sponges and fishes trapped in the
pools. We were a hundred meters out and there were starfishes
everywhere.
|
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| Two
hours passed within a breath and the rumble of the darkening sky signal
our return to shore. As usual, you tired easily, and asked to be piggybacked.
Why not, I said. There will be a time when you will grow up and I
will not be able to do so again. As soon as we were back to the rocky
outcrop, it began to drizzle. We took shelter under the canopy of
the seashore nutmeg and got our raincoats on. The sea rose steadily
and covered the meadow of sea grasses like the drawing of the curtain
to signal the end of a show. It was time to go. I look back in fond
memory how two of us retraced our path along the forested shoreline
under the rain. We took off our caps just for the fun of it. |
| The
moistened trunks and roots looked so enriched in tone over the smooth
boulders. Even the pebbles became alive in livid colors.The rain also
brought the birds back into the tiny forested home. We too are going
home. Every creature, big or small, has a home to return to. With
you in my hand, I bated a final farewell to the families of starfishes
that had finally returned to the swollen sea. |
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I
wrote this, my dear son, so that this memory will stay with you forever.
I hope you will grow up to feel the same as I do for the home that
we share with all these wonderful creatures. I hope you too can experience
this unique place with your own child and carry on for yourself the
immortality I felt when I was there with you. I am also dedicating
this poem to you and hope you will discover
for yourself that the true sense of being is being with nature.
Love,
Dad |
'Joseph
Lai's letter to his son depicts very movingly the beauty and poetry of nature
and her place in our personal memories and shared heritage. The writing
is given great poignancy by the sense of loss or impending loss that threatens
all nature, particularly in Singapore. All of us must have realised at some
point in time what this piece expresses - that, in the face of progress
and affluence, the legacy we leave our children is that significant places
in our lives may no longer exist except as precious memories.' - Dr Geh
Min, President of the Nature Society (Singapore) |