Death
Upon discovering that he has been requested to write something to be read at our grandfather's funeral.
Aiya: I want it to be funny.
Me: I'm the one who has to read it. You know I have absolutely no comedic timing.
Aiya: No, for real, it's going to be uproarious. You'll see.
Me: Okay, how do you propose to do this?
Aiya: Knock, knock.
Me: Who's there?
Aiya: Not Pappa.
Me: *groan* Duuude. Do you actually expect me to say "'Not Pappa,' who??"
A post-mortem on Thathi's eulogy where he conveniently swapped "Amma" and "Thatha" (the terminology he's used all his life) for "mom" and "dad"
Me: Thathi, seriously? What the hell? Mom and Dad? Even though Aiya and I are so white we never freaking called you and Ammi that.
Cousin #1: Yes bappi. What was up with that? Were you trying to prove how Canadian you are now?
Boisterous Aunt: No men. The sun was coming onto his face, I'm sure he was just disoriented and couldn't concentrate.
Grandmother: It was a lovely eulogy. But you know even through the tears I couldn't help but wonder why at that point in time you decided to start calling us "Mom" and "Dad"
Thathi: Well. At least people could understand what I was saying.
Me: Hey! I can't help that I have an accent that no one in this country seems to understand.
At the Achcars. Cheez unleashed an unsuspecting, innocent fellow who was visiting from India into our midst.
Sahib: So I heard you're down for your grandfather's funeral?
Me: Yeah, it was on Wednesday actually. We went through all of his stuff today. I flicked one of his cigarette lighters, look it matches my cigarette case.
Psylog: Ooo let's see the case! *proceeds to rifle through the contents of my case in an unseemly manner.*
Me: And look, this is his...*begins to point at the snazzy tie that brings together numerous parts of my ensemble*
Psylog: *looks up from rifling* Seriously, STOP TALKING ABOUT THE TIE. NO ONE CARES.
Me: *sputtering* but...but...I'm still in mourning!
Sahib: *Looks on in utter horror*
Inn on the Green post-dinner with the family and pre-quiz
Smackity: RASTI!!!!!!
Mansage: Yeah. He's already had a few to drink. Just sit down and ignore him.
Me: Kermz, shove over!
Kermz: Where are you coming from?
Me: Oh, I had dinner with the family.
Kermz: *Gives me the once over*
Me: What?
Kermz: Oh. No. Nothing.
Smackity: Rasti you do realise that some of your err, assets are on display. *giggling*
Me: But. But. I'm wearing grey, navy blue and white!
Kermz: Right. Because you're still in mourning no?
Clawed.
It was really nice to be able to unexpectedly meet up with Aunty and the Fascist especially since the grand reunion was not supposed to be until sometime in May when the two of them would be headed to Europe.
At Global Towers. A favourite haunt of ours in the old days.
Mansage: Call up Aunty, she said she may be able to join us after work.
Me: *Dials* AUNTY! I hear you may be able to join us for a bit of a claw session this evening?
Aunty: Indeed little one, it'll be nice to hang out like the old days. *said with uncharacteristic affection* Where are you two?
Me: Global Towers!
Aunty: What the hell? You guys are such bloody losers.
Aunty: Seriously. What' wrong with you?
Me: Why?
Aunty: You've been keeping the wrong company in Canada. Pretty soon I'm going to have to disown you.
Me: Eh? Disown?! Aunty! No!
Mansage: *looks on with bemusement*
Aunty: You have lost your claws.
Me: Surely you jest?
Aunty: We have sat here for 20 minutes and you still haven't made one ageist remark against me.
Me: I'm still in mourning?
Dinner at Agra. A favourite picnic spot. Aunty kept us waiting for an hour.
Mansage: Call Aunty!
Me: No, I called her already, you call aunty.
Mansage: Call Aunty and tell her that I'm so desperate I'm ready to hump this sausage. *points at the phallic looking pillow*
Me: Yeah. No, I'm not telling her that.
Mansage: I'm hungry.
Me: Yeah. I am too.
Mansage: *points at pillow beside me* Open up that sausage, run your hand up it and turn it on.
Both: *Dying of laughter.*
Me: That doesn't even make any SENSE.
Mansage: That should make it on the internets. I'm hungry.
Me: Yeah. I am too.
Aunty: Okay, what shall we have?
Mansage: *natters off the list of things we've pre-thunk up*
Aunty: Okay. Fine.
Me: But wait. Mansage you wanted the lamb no?
Mansage: Yeah, but Aunty doesn't eat that, so we'll go with the chicken instead.
Me: Sin men, just because she's mutton* doesn't mean that we need to have a meal with no lamb.
Aunty: That was weak. But considering you're still easing yourself into things. I'll give it to you.
*The Colombian Dictator, upon seeing old women in age inappropriate attire, would often remark that said specimens looked like "mutton dressed as lamb."
Me: Okay, we've set out an agenda of things to discuss...
Aunty: An agenda? What? Why?
Me: We had too! You're only gracing us with your presence for a short while and there's much to go over.
Aunty: Okay. Fine. What's the first thing?
Me: The ex.
Aunty: What. NO. WAIT. We're not discussing that. *Look of utter horror.* In a few words? Vacous, vapid, immature, silly...
Me: HA. I thought we're not discussing that?
Aunty: Yes, but this is why you hang out with me.
Me: You know Mansage was getting pretty desperate while waiting for you to show up.
Aunty: Oh in what way?
Me: I'm almost too frightened to say. You know how sometimes if you don't say things out loud it's almost like they never happened?
Aunty: Yes and when you do speak out it just solidifies it?
Me: Yeah. Somethings are just better left unsaid.
Mansage: I have to choo.
Aunty: So then go.
Mansage: *drops a pillow on the ground*
Me: Dude, you dropped a pillow.
Aunty: Typical man. Violates and then just casts aside when it's served his purpose.
"zomg. It's just like irc up in here"
- psylog
The dangers of hanging out with the same people you waste copious of amounts of time on the internets with. You have been warned.
him: ...and then i saw him, head bowed utterly raw and honest. Fully aware of the fact that no one gives a fuck about him. Man. I can never blog about the good things damn it. But seriously psylog...the pussy this guy gets is unbelievable. I mean we're talking about the kind of girls I stalk on facebook. THAT'S HOW GOOD.
Discussing the nitty gritty details of music selection on the jukebox.
me: WTF! Is this? Tina Turner?
loverlord: Okay. You know what. We should seriously have a new rule about the amount of times a diva can be played.
migrainecat: Yeah seriously. I think this is the second time we're hearing this song.
TinaTurner's#1Fan: Noez! You don't understand. This song. THIS SONG. It used to be my theme song *starts singing "You're Simply the Best"*
me: I can't believe I'm hearing this, nay witnessing you do this.in.public.
TT#1F: This is nothing. I used to sing this into a hairbrush and jump on my bed singing along. This and Richard Marx, my dirty little secrets.
migrainecat: Yeah. Not so secret anymore eh?
TT#1F: Aw shit.
Monday, March 24, 2008
Wednesday, March 12, 2008
Shiiiiiz.
Thanks for all kind words and thoughts throughout this last week chickadees. It's always nice knowing that your peeps are thinking about you no matter what part of the world they or you are in.
Access to the interbutts has been non-existent until Sunday when I figured out the glories of shitty Dialog WAP. (Is that what it's called? Meh.) This comes to you from my Uncle's house in Boralesgumwa. Before I get into the nitty gritty deets of what's been going down since we landed last week I figured I'd post some of the lesser emo journal excerpts because I'm a lazy bastard.
Monday, March 3, 2008 10:17 PM.
As much as you know it's coming and however much you try to prepare yourself for it, death really has the ability to take you completely and utterly off guard. I had just come back with Abi from Union Station after dropping off Debbie (who was en route to Montreal). The two of us were sitting in the kitchen just shooting the breeze. Neither of us knowing that this would be the last we'd be seeing each other for a good long time. Abs was getting her shiz together to leave, Ammi was watching a ridiculous Hindi movie, Thathi had Oliver in the folds of his sarong. We were laughing at the ESL subtitles, "emotion" became "a motion."
Then the call came.
Sudden phone calls in the middle of the night freak my parents out. We got the news that Loku Mammah had died in the wee hours of the morning in 1991. Even now the thought is always looming in the back of our minds that any phone call coming in at that ungodly hour is definitely going to be a bad one.
But It was 7:00 PM Sunday night. Nothing ever noteworthy happens on a Sunday night. Johnny Bappa was the one who called, and I picked up.
Me: Ah, Johnny! How how??
Him: Pappa's dead.
Me: ...what?
I thought I had heard incorrectly. It's not unusual for us to get phone calls/text messages saying that Pappa's in the hospital. The man did have a heart condition.
Him: *voice cracking*
Me: Johnny Bappa?
Him: *unintelligible* Pappa is gone.
Me: Oh shit. Hang on, let me get Thathi. *turns to Thathi,* Something has happened to Pappa.
I knew what had happened to Pappa. But I didn't want to be the one to break the news.
Johnny Bappa couldn't speak, he ended up passing the phone to Bola.
Bola: Bappi, Pappa passed away this morning
Thathi: *frozen*
Bola: It just happened, we're on our way to Ratmalana. *voice cracks* We've called the ambulance.
I grabbed the phone. Thathi wasn't moving, he was just holding the phone in his hand with a blank expression on his face and tears welling up in his eyes.
Me: Bola, what the hell is going on? Who's with Mamma?
And that's what began it all.
I feel utterly overwhelmed right now. I've got two suitcases with my life packed into them. This afternoon I went to the bank and withdrew my entire (paltry) life savings and made them up into traveler's cheques. I didn't expect to be leaving for life in London with a funeral thrown in between. I never really thought I'd go without getting a chance to properly kick off my farewell tour in Toronto.
I also need to wrap my head around the notion of going back to my grandparents home and finding it half empty.
I don't have that many memories associated with my family or life in Sri Lanka prior to the time we migrated. When we left from my grandparents' home in Ratmalana all those years ago, Thathi's side of the family cried as if he had died. My grandparents were inconsolable. Maybe I watch too many Wes Anderson movies but recalling the day we left in my mind's eye it's always been in slow motion.
Now we're going back to an actual funeral house.
Tuesday, March 4, 2007 2:22 PM (Toronto time. i have no effing clue what the time is in Colombo).
The last two hours of the London - Colombo leg are always the worst. It feels like there's not enough time to get a good snooze and to even try and watch a movie it's impossible since the a/v equipment gets packed up during the final hour.
Usually this is where we're left to excitedly chatter about the plans for the coming weeks in Colombo. How great it'll be to get away from the shit Canadian weather, overeat, see the family and shop.
I'm hoping we don't make it in on time. Actually scrap that, I was sort of wishing that we'd just miss our connecting flight from London altogether. Neither of us are looking forward to the reality that's going to face us once we land. The truth of the situation is living halfway across on the other side of the world has its benefits. I get to avoid a lot of drama and issues that would normally be our problem. (Thathi's the eldest. Yipee.)
On Monday morning while we were scrambling to get ourselves together before leaving Thathi had to go into the office to tie up some last minute things so I was tasked with calling Johnny Bappa and giving him our flight information. He in turn filled me in on the funeral arrangements that had been tentatively made. I'm glad I'm not there.
If things had worked out exactly according to the plan I had set out for myself when I last left Sri Lanka I would've been in the thick of all of this. My target was to be in Colombo by mid-February. I'm not sad that I didn't get a chance to say goodbye because no one really did. Papa died in his sleep, we knew the next heart attack would take him but no one knew exactly when that would be. The cowardly side of me doesn't think I'd be able to handle my grieving grandmother or uncles.
As Labro and Alby fully well know, I don't usually do well with tears. I don't even remember the last time I cried. It's not because I have problems with people expressing their emotions, it's more because I'm an emotional stunted bastard so I never know how to appropriately react vis a vis a mascara stained face. (Hey Labro!)
Another small issue is that of the body.
Dead bodies?
DO NOT WANT.
I blame this on Ammi. When Amammah died she forced Aiya, myself, Vindhiya and Paul to kiss her before the casket was closed.
Eww?
damn.straight.
The very last memory that I have of Amammah is of me bracing and very awkwardly moving towards her ashy forehead. *shudder* Just thinking about it brings back the memory of the coldness on my lips. Due to this childhood trauma I make it a point to never actually "view" anything when I go to viewings.
Enter reason to be an utter coward #2.
In Sri Lanka (so I hear) it is common for people to have the viewings of their loved ones in their own homes. Not in funeral parlours or in Churches. Apparently this gives a chance to all the members of the neighbourhood to come around and have one last gawk. As a result of the above scarring alongside my screaming inner Puritan I find something inherently creepy about looking at a corpse. But that's just me. (When I die it's going to be closed casket thank ye.)
Thathi tried his best to strong arm my uncles into strong arming my grandmother not to go the Sri Lankan route and opt for a viewing at a funeral parlour. Unfortunately it would seem that his three little brothers hold no sway over their mom.
When I get to my grandparents' home in approximately another 1 hour and 30 minutes I will be greeted in the living room by my grandfather in his brown suit chillaxing in his casket.
Wednesday, March 5, 2008 8:00 AM
It has been many years since the entire family has been at my grandparent's home for our arrival. Usually they pop in later on in the day since our flights tend to land really early. I didn't know how everyone would be when we came through the gate at 4 this morning. Mamma was fortunately sleeping. I met Bola on the driveway before heading into the house and hurriedly asked her wtf was going on with the body. Didn't really fancy walking into the the livingroom and seeing a casket where the coffee table used to be. (Instead it was over by where the dinning table is normally and horror of horrors, the head was right by the spot I usually sit. *shudder*)
The autistic cat has not entered the house since Monday morning. Instead he stalks around the garden, chills out on top of the water tank or makes the rare appearance near the bedroom windows. He's either very perceptive, and like me is freaked out about dead bodies or he's just a skittish cat who hates people. I will not judge.
I'm exhausted as is everyone else. The rest of the family has been going on little to no sleep since Monday. I don't know what to make of anything. The ride from the airport to the house was so unremarkable it was sad. Reaffirmed to me that Colombo has lost its charm. I just felt suffocated looking out the windows at the piles of crap and feeling absolutely apathetic. The feeling that there is nothing left to be gleaned from the confines of this city. I never really thought I could feel that way about any place, because it's never like that when I'm driving from Pearson back to the house.
I suppose that I'll never consider Colombo or even this country to be my "home away from home" because I've never felt so suffocated and restricted in Toronto. Mind you yes, I've felt the need to run away screaming because of utter despondency, but never a feeling like this.
Maybe it's just the humidity?
Access to the interbutts has been non-existent until Sunday when I figured out the glories of shitty Dialog WAP. (Is that what it's called? Meh.) This comes to you from my Uncle's house in Boralesgumwa. Before I get into the nitty gritty deets of what's been going down since we landed last week I figured I'd post some of the lesser emo journal excerpts because I'm a lazy bastard.
Monday, March 3, 2008 10:17 PM.
As much as you know it's coming and however much you try to prepare yourself for it, death really has the ability to take you completely and utterly off guard. I had just come back with Abi from Union Station after dropping off Debbie (who was en route to Montreal). The two of us were sitting in the kitchen just shooting the breeze. Neither of us knowing that this would be the last we'd be seeing each other for a good long time. Abs was getting her shiz together to leave, Ammi was watching a ridiculous Hindi movie, Thathi had Oliver in the folds of his sarong. We were laughing at the ESL subtitles, "emotion" became "a motion."
Then the call came.
Sudden phone calls in the middle of the night freak my parents out. We got the news that Loku Mammah had died in the wee hours of the morning in 1991. Even now the thought is always looming in the back of our minds that any phone call coming in at that ungodly hour is definitely going to be a bad one.
But It was 7:00 PM Sunday night. Nothing ever noteworthy happens on a Sunday night. Johnny Bappa was the one who called, and I picked up.
Me: Ah, Johnny! How how??
Him: Pappa's dead.
Me: ...what?
I thought I had heard incorrectly. It's not unusual for us to get phone calls/text messages saying that Pappa's in the hospital. The man did have a heart condition.
Him: *voice cracking*
Me: Johnny Bappa?
Him: *unintelligible* Pappa is gone.
Me: Oh shit. Hang on, let me get Thathi. *turns to Thathi,* Something has happened to Pappa.
I knew what had happened to Pappa. But I didn't want to be the one to break the news.
Johnny Bappa couldn't speak, he ended up passing the phone to Bola.
Bola: Bappi, Pappa passed away this morning
Thathi: *frozen*
Bola: It just happened, we're on our way to Ratmalana. *voice cracks* We've called the ambulance.
I grabbed the phone. Thathi wasn't moving, he was just holding the phone in his hand with a blank expression on his face and tears welling up in his eyes.
Me: Bola, what the hell is going on? Who's with Mamma?
And that's what began it all.
I feel utterly overwhelmed right now. I've got two suitcases with my life packed into them. This afternoon I went to the bank and withdrew my entire (paltry) life savings and made them up into traveler's cheques. I didn't expect to be leaving for life in London with a funeral thrown in between. I never really thought I'd go without getting a chance to properly kick off my farewell tour in Toronto.
I also need to wrap my head around the notion of going back to my grandparents home and finding it half empty.
I don't have that many memories associated with my family or life in Sri Lanka prior to the time we migrated. When we left from my grandparents' home in Ratmalana all those years ago, Thathi's side of the family cried as if he had died. My grandparents were inconsolable. Maybe I watch too many Wes Anderson movies but recalling the day we left in my mind's eye it's always been in slow motion.
Now we're going back to an actual funeral house.
Tuesday, March 4, 2007 2:22 PM (Toronto time. i have no effing clue what the time is in Colombo).
The last two hours of the London - Colombo leg are always the worst. It feels like there's not enough time to get a good snooze and to even try and watch a movie it's impossible since the a/v equipment gets packed up during the final hour.
Usually this is where we're left to excitedly chatter about the plans for the coming weeks in Colombo. How great it'll be to get away from the shit Canadian weather, overeat, see the family and shop.
I'm hoping we don't make it in on time. Actually scrap that, I was sort of wishing that we'd just miss our connecting flight from London altogether. Neither of us are looking forward to the reality that's going to face us once we land. The truth of the situation is living halfway across on the other side of the world has its benefits. I get to avoid a lot of drama and issues that would normally be our problem. (Thathi's the eldest. Yipee.)
On Monday morning while we were scrambling to get ourselves together before leaving Thathi had to go into the office to tie up some last minute things so I was tasked with calling Johnny Bappa and giving him our flight information. He in turn filled me in on the funeral arrangements that had been tentatively made. I'm glad I'm not there.
If things had worked out exactly according to the plan I had set out for myself when I last left Sri Lanka I would've been in the thick of all of this. My target was to be in Colombo by mid-February. I'm not sad that I didn't get a chance to say goodbye because no one really did. Papa died in his sleep, we knew the next heart attack would take him but no one knew exactly when that would be. The cowardly side of me doesn't think I'd be able to handle my grieving grandmother or uncles.
As Labro and Alby fully well know, I don't usually do well with tears. I don't even remember the last time I cried. It's not because I have problems with people expressing their emotions, it's more because I'm an emotional stunted bastard so I never know how to appropriately react vis a vis a mascara stained face. (Hey Labro!)
Another small issue is that of the body.
Dead bodies?
DO NOT WANT.
I blame this on Ammi. When Amammah died she forced Aiya, myself, Vindhiya and Paul to kiss her before the casket was closed.
Eww?
damn.straight.
The very last memory that I have of Amammah is of me bracing and very awkwardly moving towards her ashy forehead. *shudder* Just thinking about it brings back the memory of the coldness on my lips. Due to this childhood trauma I make it a point to never actually "view" anything when I go to viewings.
Enter reason to be an utter coward #2.
In Sri Lanka (so I hear) it is common for people to have the viewings of their loved ones in their own homes. Not in funeral parlours or in Churches. Apparently this gives a chance to all the members of the neighbourhood to come around and have one last gawk. As a result of the above scarring alongside my screaming inner Puritan I find something inherently creepy about looking at a corpse. But that's just me. (When I die it's going to be closed casket thank ye.)
Thathi tried his best to strong arm my uncles into strong arming my grandmother not to go the Sri Lankan route and opt for a viewing at a funeral parlour. Unfortunately it would seem that his three little brothers hold no sway over their mom.
When I get to my grandparents' home in approximately another 1 hour and 30 minutes I will be greeted in the living room by my grandfather in his brown suit chillaxing in his casket.
Wednesday, March 5, 2008 8:00 AM
It has been many years since the entire family has been at my grandparent's home for our arrival. Usually they pop in later on in the day since our flights tend to land really early. I didn't know how everyone would be when we came through the gate at 4 this morning. Mamma was fortunately sleeping. I met Bola on the driveway before heading into the house and hurriedly asked her wtf was going on with the body. Didn't really fancy walking into the the livingroom and seeing a casket where the coffee table used to be. (Instead it was over by where the dinning table is normally and horror of horrors, the head was right by the spot I usually sit. *shudder*)
The autistic cat has not entered the house since Monday morning. Instead he stalks around the garden, chills out on top of the water tank or makes the rare appearance near the bedroom windows. He's either very perceptive, and like me is freaked out about dead bodies or he's just a skittish cat who hates people. I will not judge.
I'm exhausted as is everyone else. The rest of the family has been going on little to no sleep since Monday. I don't know what to make of anything. The ride from the airport to the house was so unremarkable it was sad. Reaffirmed to me that Colombo has lost its charm. I just felt suffocated looking out the windows at the piles of crap and feeling absolutely apathetic. The feeling that there is nothing left to be gleaned from the confines of this city. I never really thought I could feel that way about any place, because it's never like that when I'm driving from Pearson back to the house.
I suppose that I'll never consider Colombo or even this country to be my "home away from home" because I've never felt so suffocated and restricted in Toronto. Mind you yes, I've felt the need to run away screaming because of utter despondency, but never a feeling like this.
Maybe it's just the humidity?
Sunday, March 02, 2008
My Grandfather just died. About an hour ago actually.
I'm leaving for Sri Lanka on Monday (tomorrow) I don't know what this means for my travel plans to London, or Barcelona or anything really. Just thought I'd give you guys a heads up. Sorry that this is so impersonal. Easiest way to do things at the moment.
Thanks kittens.
I'm leaving for Sri Lanka on Monday (tomorrow) I don't know what this means for my travel plans to London, or Barcelona or anything really. Just thought I'd give you guys a heads up. Sorry that this is so impersonal. Easiest way to do things at the moment.
Thanks kittens.
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