嘉榆 found me first.
I think the year was 2000. I was an avid homepage diary publisher. We were all into the internet hype. We searched, we wrote, we uploaded. Like many stories, browsing the net lead him onto my hompage's doorstep.
That Christmas I travelled to Hong Kong. I met up with him and Hiu-Mei. The location was a community centre for new immigrants from China. I helped tutor kids, we hung out afterwards, and I remember we went into an arcade before I went home.
That experience showed me how hypocritical HK ppl have been, especially the HK ppl who have immigrated to the overseas. In Canada we receive so much from the gov: ESL classes, equality education, milk money. At the same moment we mock the Chinese immigrants who chose HK to be their homes. We laugh at their accents, we fear their hard-work, we hiss at their existence. I tell anybody who'd offer an ear: the most serious form of racism against Chinese ppl aren't from the White ppl, it's from the Chinese ppl.
After my return to Canada, Hiu-Mei sent me a few of Kar-Yu's books. He became a writer after his stint at the community centre. Later he turned to teaching as his way to put a positive influence into kids. He loved everyone passionately; everyone was touched and changed.
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From Hiu-Mei's blog I knew Kar-Yu was in bad shape. His condition worsened, he couldn't leave the hospital anymore. I knew it was time. He outlived all the constraints being put on his shoulders. His days on Earth was closer to 29 than the 9-years that his doctors had prescribed.
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I've had a few friends that passed away.
His passing was the only one that I wished God would take him sooner. When he entered his last stage, God took him back quickly. God didn't make him sick on his bed for 2 years. Minimize the pain, minimize the torture, minimize the tears. On him, on his family, on his friends. He finished his marathon. It was time to get to the jacuzzi.
I never know what to say at the end. I keep my heart quiet and my lips shut.
I don't know what to say at the end.
