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Selamat Jalan Alang...

Last night around Maghrib, we lost my Alang Manah, my aunt, my father's sister. She's been treated at the Putrajaya Hospital ICU for the past week and finally passed away... on a Friday.

I can't say I'm very close to her, but still, she's the aunt you must visit on the 1st Hari Raya morning and whose kenduris you must attend. And she's the one you must seek when you attend other people's kenduris. When I was little, every weekend we would go balik kampung and my father would take me and my brother to visit her. I last met her last Hari Raya. She doesn't recognize people anymore, but she was healthy then.

I was late and was the last to kiss her forehead before they close her up and performed prayers. I stood outside with my daughter watching the the action from afar. I'd rather stand outside, loss in my own thoughts and feelings, then sitting with the rest of the womenfolk in the kitchen. At least, I can hear the tahlil and prayers and amin the doas. When the body was taken out, my father gave that little speech, thanking everybody and stuff. I can't help but shed tears watching my father. This is the sister who actually raised him after his mother died in the 1940s. And now she's gone.

My Alang Manah was the one who cleaned up my daughter's uri after I gave birth. She used to be a bidan. She was the one who told my father that my daughter had her umbilical cord wrapped around her neck - just by looking at the uri. The doctor never told us. I got to know about it from the nurses after I came back to the hospital because my daughter had jaundice.

I last met her when she's really "OK" about 2 years ago when my other aunt - my father's other sister - passed away. She then had Alzhimer after that and can't remember much. I came early to visit, my aunt had just passed away and there were not many people around. I sat with Mak Lang and people were coming and going asking her advise. When she was strong, she's the one who bathe the bodies of females who died at my kampung. Someone mentioned about bathing the body and she said to go get the bathing container from the mosque. "Jangan dipangku masa mandi", she said, "nanti mula lah, kena badi lah, demam lah. Pakai bekas mandi kat masjid tu." Then she turned to me, "Masa aku nanti bagitau semua orang jangan pangku".

Now, the images I have in mind are my brother and me playing at the big trees at her house, climbing and hiding among the protruding roots, and the voice of my Mak Lang shouting - "Masuk dalam, minum!".

Selamat jalan Mak Lang...

Al Fatihah.

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