Funeral, and a Poor Man’s Dinner.

It was at the crematorium in Kampung Tunku, strangely just a little way off my brother’s old, old primary school back when we were living in PJ.


It was an aunt’s… my father’s cousin, to be precise. I wish I can say something nice here, but the truth is… the truth is, really, that I didn’t know her name. I knew she was 60 plus and she was never married. When I was told about it yesterday, I couldn’t remember how she really looked. I’ve seen her almost yearly when I went down for Chinese New Year. I know to call her Ah Boh (Hainanese, for elder aunt). I remember that she would serve us drink, ask us to eat cookies, chat with my parents and my relatives. I heard that she was a good daughter and she took care of her mother. I heard that she had been coughing since last September and that she was very, very sick, but chose to hide it. I heard these from the conversations that took place around the crematorium.


The fact remains, however, is that I never really knew her.


Not only until I saw her picture in front of the alter, golden drapes hung flanking it in an air-conditioned room that - in spite of everything, reminded me of the sports complex lobby in Taman Melati, did I actually recognise the face, the quiet demeanour, the serenity in her looks that I would know, would remember, but would forget; perhaps she was too distant, and maybe once a year wouldn’t commit her to my memory… but what excuse do I have? I haven’t one. I know that myself, at least.


So I chose to walk up to her coffin for a final glance; I was the youngest to do it. Some of us wouldn’t, because for them it’s rightful that the last memory of her would be the smiling, ever placid face we see year after year, rather than the face in the casket. My memories of her would, regardless, be her, so I felt that I should see her before she was cremated. She was peaceful.


Then there were prayers. Her nieces and nephews did it, since she didn’t have children. It was a traditional Chinese send-off, so the elders - the ones senior to her - aren’t allowed to do it. We sat and watched and listened to the monk’s chants, her bells and cymbals ringing in a definite resonance, like trance, dreamlike and distant. Then we paid our last respects, and bowed. Three times we had to turn away and look downwards, as respect, I hear, or so that the spirit wouldn’t feel the overbearing sadness of departure; once was when the coffin was closed, once when the coffin was moved to the entrance of the crematorium, and lastly was when she was finally departing. I only heard the bells and whispers.


And then, that was it. I simply hung around and observed. Among the relatives were funeral service personnel, for all in the world dressed like waiters in a wedding dinner, doing what they do. “Death is a good business,” my brother said. I agreed, quietly. Death is a business; you stake your life with it all the time. It’s a fair trade, mostly.


Somewhere between the words exchanged among each family member and relatives, the faint smell of joss sticks in silent whiffs, we bade them farewell, and left for home.


**************


Here’s something you can do if the rich, ever over-fulfilling taste of rich food made you wish for something so simple it’s almost a meal of body-cleansing properties;


Boil rice with a whole lot of water, of which you’ll acquire something like congee, which is in fact TeoChew porridge (don’t forget some salt and big chunks of ginger for a slight, gentle tang).


Hard-boil a couple of salted duck eggs, and crack a few Century eggs for good measure.

Put 4 pieces of fermented bean curd (otherwise known as fu yi in Cantonese) in a saucer.

Fry up some salted fish (whatever should work, but I forgot the name of the best type). Oil and frying pan will do. Fry them with ginger slices, preferably.

Open up a can of Fried Dace with Black Beans (godliness in a can). Mircowave it.

Open up a can of braised peanuts and a can of luncheon meat (best cooked with egg over a pan first). Fry a salted-carrot omelette.

(Note that each of them, save the porridge, is optional, but this is the culmination of the best things. Other stuff might include fried anchovies, fried peanuts and the sometimes preferred pork-leg thingy, either canned or cooked).

Once you’ve assembled all of them, you get what I call the cheapskate dinner, or the Poor Man’s Dinner. It’s TeoChew porridge with the best stuff you can buy for oh-ban-me-for-life cheapness. You might get hungry after several hours, but at the end of it, it’s a dinner so pure it felt like sip of Himalayan spring water.

Don’t, however, visit one of the many restaurants serving porridge like this. Unless it’s buffet type, you’re wasting your money.

Now then, I’m already hungry.