Why do the fools fly?
Better to die sooner than late.
For die we must.
— Denethor, The Lord of the Rings: The Return of the King
A small drizzle for this year’s Qing Ming, and it’s back to my grandfather’s grave just this afternoon.
20 years I will be this year, and 20 years I’ve visited the grandfather that I never knew. The man that I’ve heard only through stories, like the one where he was nearly killed in “Sook Ching” - whereby tons of Chinese were killed by the Japanese. It was apparently (according to my father), that he barely escaped it when the war ended.
To my best memory, as a child, I was surprised when I saw my own name carved on his grave, together with my cousins, my uncles, my aunts, my parents, and my sister’s.
Not forgetting when I laid a pink dandelion that I had found nearby on his grave, only to be worried that it has been blown away by the downpour soon after we got in the car.
