A Farewell to my Grand Auntie-'Minachi'

Today I received a sad news that my grand auntie, the oldest surviving relative has passed away. She was wife to my Grand Uncle who was the younger brother to my grandfather. His name was Paul Martin as Sinhalese from Sri Lanka,  unlike my grand father he refused to be converted to Islam like my grandfather did upon marriage to my grand mother who was devout Muslim from Deli, in Indonesia. My grand uncle married a Hindu and became a Hindu and today his wife just passed away, A Piece of the family tree falls off to the ground to be buried in time and forgotten in memory; she was a very soft and gentle lady and always has a sweet sad smile about her. I used to spend times visiting my grand uncle's family to play with my uncle Ranjan, and the two sisters Kamala and Susila and the youngest brother Sukananda. I looked forward to the Indian cooking and sitting on the floor with my uncles and aunties having a good time.

All  that I can remember is that they had always lived in the quarters of the 'Old' Methodist Boys School where my grand uncle had worked as the caretaker and he was also the caretaker grounds keeper of the Mahindrama Buddhist Temple on Kampar Road, across the road from the MBS. This is the very same temple my grandfather was commissioned to paint the inner wall murals and ceilling when the Temple was constructed. This was how my grand father ended up in Penang he was the Buddhist Michael Angelo, and his works are still as it was today; the Life and Times of the World and Time Honored One; the Buddha Shakyamuni, or the life of Prince Siddharta Gautama. Before i was relocated to Terengganu and converted to Islam I was raised a Buddhist for twelve years and as a child would visit this temple every weekend for the Pali lessons. When I mentioned that my granduncle was the ground keeper of the temple I could only imagine how like a mythical plaace the temple grounds was with tall palm trees and white sand in the quadrangles, like the Japanese sand garden. I can still feel the warm breeze and the smell of incense that filled the whole area and I can still see serene half close eyes and the half smile of the Sittng Buddha under the large Bo tree; he is sitting there today.

With the departure of my grand auntie 'Minachi' a piece of our ethnic heritage slips into the past as today our families drifts far apart from one another. Most of my nephews and nieces and my children included has now idea of her existence, their Great Grand Auntie. I will remember her as a fading background image of my past and filed it away into  my subconscious storage bank. Her smiles, her cooking and how she dressed are all etched into these files as a piece of the jig saw that makes up my heritage. Three religious faith are intertwined into this scenario, Islam, Buddhism and Hinduism and being me, I had made deeper contacts with each through my childhood experiences. Today I feel spiritually rich from having been exposed to all three at the same time in one chidlhood age. Farewell to you my Grand Auntie, may you be reborn into a more pleasant realm and be among those you once loved; may you become a Buddha free from pain and suffering.