The Children

Some time back, Azman, Sofie’s son (the one studying at a culinary school), called to inform me that his college was arranging for a trip to board a cruise ship as part of their programme. It was to be just a day trip, for the students to look around especially at the ship’s kitchen practice. Well, the trip was supposed to be last Thursday, and I was supposed to give him some pocket money the day before (I didn’t want to give him the pocket money earlier in case he finished them before the trip).

So on Wednesday morning, I sent him a text message informing him that I’d go and see him at his hostel after asar. After a while, probably in between his classes, he called to say that the trip had to be postponed to July as a very important visitor was going to visit the college on Friday. Ahh… at least he bothered to tell me the truth instead of just accepting the pocket money quietly and spend it on something else.

Just when I thought Azman would be the only one of Sofie’s children giving me (and their aunt Rozi) headaches, now Azlan, the eldest boy, is beginning to give us headaches as well. He is supposed to report to IKM this coming Monday, and since he had been doing a temporary job while waiting for all the results to come out, we told him to quit his job soonest possible to enable him to do whatever necessary before reporting to IKM. There’s a medical check up to be done, a bank account to be opened, and some documents needing to be certified.

Azlan did take 2 days leave earlier, but the 2 days were wasted doing nothing. Then he had to go outstation. He was planning his last day at work to be on Friday 22nd June. So when would he be doing all the things mentioned above? We told him to come back by Wednesday, 20th, but he never did. Calls went unanswered and his aunt began to worry. What if he suddenly decided he didn’t want to further his studies? On my part, there’s not much else I can do. I’ve done what I could.

Well, this morning his aunt Rozi sent me a text message again, saying that Azlan had just arrived home after subuh, and she asked if I could call and check on him. She herself was at work. I did call, but again, no answer. I suppose he was still sleeping? I told the aunt I gave up. Lantak dialah!

Anyway, remember Zana’s 10 year old daughter? The one I went to visit last week at PICU? After no news for a week, I decided to call Zana to find out of the latest development. Apparently the girl passed away on Thursday evening and the funeral was yesterday morning, the very same day that I decided to call Zana. For the moment Zana has no plans yet about her future. She had lost one of her twin sons before. The one still alive is now at a shelter home. Although Zana had taken him home before to stay together with her and her family, somehow her family couldn’t seem to accept him and always ended up beating him up. So Zana sent him back to the shelter so he could have a better life there.

But now that her daughter is gone, will Zana end up taking her son back from the shelter home? I guess we will just have to wait and see…