It was slightly past 8. We had jst finished our dinner. Mum did the cleaning, while me and sis were about to get ready for our nite journey to granny’s place. We packed our clothes and boarded a non air-cond bus to Pudu interchange. It was almost 10 by the time we reached there. Pudu was crowded as ever on late Saturday nite. Having a bumpy bus ride, i was feeling nausea and terrible headache. Nevertheless, mum persuaded me that the next journey gonna be a quick one. Well, we waited for quite some time before the next bus arrived. This time, we were heading to granny’s flat in Cheras. Feeling sort of migraine, i dragged myself into the minibus, while mum carried my luggage. We got down at a junction in Cheras, a hilly slope, and we had to walk up the slope towards granny’s flat. Dreaded and reluctantly, i walked super slow, trying to be strong despite feeling so much burden on my head. I was about to collapse anytime soon. Mum stopped over some stalls to buy supper for granny and aunt. Satay and noodles were their favourites. And soon, we were in a crowded dai-pai-dong. I felt stuffy and suffocated in it but sis was there to accompany, so it was fine. It was half past eleven then, three of us waited for our order, it seems like forever. The smoke coming from the burning ash at satay stall made me even dizzier.
We finally reached granny place slightly before midnite.
It was an unexpected visit, with granny not knowing our arrivals. She doesn’t hav phone at home, hence unaware of our plan. We knocked the door several times, thought that everyone in the house had gone asleep. Darn relieved when seeing granny at the door coz i was so in desperate need to have a rest. Mum had supper and long chat with granny while i pretended asleep as i wanna skip medicine. It was a comfortable one even with mattress on floor.
The next morning i was feeling all well, alive and kicking for an outing, none other than morning tea at nearby market with granny, mum and sis – 3 generation in the family. Sadly aunt wasn’t joining as she was still dozing after being disturbed by our late nite visit. That was 1990 and most probably our one and only close encounter with granny. She left us the following year.
