When we traveled home to visit, we’d always meet in Sydney Chinatown for noodles, phở, and dim sum.
My girls called him Gung Gung.
He took them to the aquarium in Sydney,
bought them clownfish soft toys,
and sang with them:
“I can find you anywhere.”
Since Petra’s birth, he and my step-mom, Abu,
visited Hong Kong each year.
Sometimes we met in Bali.
Sometimes we all flew home to Canberra or Sydney.
He ruled the wok and the pot.
He cooked us tong from scratch,
lobster from the tank,
rice fluffy and hot and sweet.
He died last year,
from a fall after losing his way to dementia.
In one year he wilted,
from Gung Gung, full of mischief,
to infant.
From driving his taxi
to the day we said goodbye,
only one winter passed.
There were years I would not speak to him.
Years of withdrawal and punishment
for how he saw the world and what he did.
I got complete with him through my work with Landmark.
I saw,
what it took from him to lose my mother.
What it took to raise his children.
That he was there,
when he pulled me out of abuse and hospitals
and brought me home to Canberra.
It took me becoming a parent
to see him as one.
I see my girls disobedient,
the way I was disobedient.
I see my girls not understanding,
the way I was not understanding.
I see my girls not forgiving,
the way I was not forgiving.
I see now how impossible it is to be the parent you want to be.
I got that by the time you learn to parent, they are fully grown.
