I have a big big family especially from my mom's side. My mom is the eldest of 9, with 5 sisters and 3 brothers. So, I have 5 aunties, and 3 uncles (really, I wonder how much stress my grandma endured all of those years).
All of my 5 aunties -all of them- had their own special times baby sited me and my siblings. Some for consecutive 4 years and more, others just for several months. One by one then, they left my house to do some real grown up works and got married with children. Now they all have their own families....except the youngest (who in fact not to be called young anymore, she's 31 next January).
She's the boldest, the most independent, the most carefree, the most enjoyable aunty one can ever hope to have. She's just 8 years older than me. So sometimes I call her by name -and add aunty at the end of my sentence- and she calls me Klak -my popular public name ;p- not Rara or Clara like the rest of my families. It's just like having a big sister.
I remember when I was 5 or 6 years old, I stayed at my grannies for couple of days (my parents went on family business or something). While I was there, she didn't go to school. I asked her," Why don't you go to school? There is no holiday. Other aunties are going." She answered me," I have special holidays in my school." I just nodded. Those couple of days I played around with her, making fake stupid biographies of other aunties, doing some traditional "inai" pedicure, looking for caterpillars and put them on a jar, I never saw them meta-morphed into butterflies.
Living in Jakarta since 2002, she earns her life by teaching English for kids and I assume she is wealthy enough for happy-go-lucky life (not really an assumption, everyone in my family knows she has big amount of saving).
Nevertheless, she never drown into luxurious life she can afford (in some measures for Jakarta dwellers). Her biggest dream is to travel around the world. Well, classic it may sounds, but that's what her saving is for. She went to Germany once and has made Berlin her starting point to conquer the earth.
The most enjoyable aunty she is.
I dance with her, I laugh and mock people with her (I mock her, she mocks me), I wander the city with her (and got lost in that cobble stones jungle) and daydream while eating ice scream with her. Where to borrow money, where to sleep, where to ask for help is unquestionably her.
And above all she always has this combination of stoicalness while at the same time she exhibits capacity to treasure all the fun, all the downs and ups, all the pains. Any certain condition as worst as it gets, as good as it gets, never gets the best of her.
I wonder if it's related to her being the youngest of 9. She was born when my mom reached age 18. I bet she was exposed to a hell amount of growing up issues of her 5 sisters and 3 brothers, ranging from teenage drama queens to that foolish hormonal lunatic songs of my uncles. So she used to play around alone.
Just like last week, when she text messaged me:
"Kla, how are you? We get series of blackouts here. I was just visited by Jehovah's witness, so I told him/her I wanted to go on some business. But I don't know where to go now. The class is on holiday hahahahaha"
and I replied "Repent, you sinner!! hahahahaha. O y I'll be having TOTAL 1st interview, long way to France.Pray for me, will y?"
and she replied with her stoic tune as always," Yup, I bet there are many sins written on my face. I always pray for you -see I'm already repent-. Got to go now, heading for nowhere"
She once told me, she came from a land above the sky - a sky country, a sky kingdom-. Part of me didn't believe it, but other part want to know the story. So I listened to her own made fairy tale (I even asked, is drink jar in sky country different from what we have here on earth?).
and I guess she has taken me believe that she came from a land above the sky.
All of my 5 aunties -all of them- had their own special times baby sited me and my siblings. Some for consecutive 4 years and more, others just for several months. One by one then, they left my house to do some real grown up works and got married with children. Now they all have their own families....except the youngest (who in fact not to be called young anymore, she's 31 next January).
She's the boldest, the most independent, the most carefree, the most enjoyable aunty one can ever hope to have. She's just 8 years older than me. So sometimes I call her by name -and add aunty at the end of my sentence- and she calls me Klak -my popular public name ;p- not Rara or Clara like the rest of my families. It's just like having a big sister.
I remember when I was 5 or 6 years old, I stayed at my grannies for couple of days (my parents went on family business or something). While I was there, she didn't go to school. I asked her," Why don't you go to school? There is no holiday. Other aunties are going." She answered me," I have special holidays in my school." I just nodded. Those couple of days I played around with her, making fake stupid biographies of other aunties, doing some traditional "inai" pedicure, looking for caterpillars and put them on a jar, I never saw them meta-morphed into butterflies.
Living in Jakarta since 2002, she earns her life by teaching English for kids and I assume she is wealthy enough for happy-go-lucky life (not really an assumption, everyone in my family knows she has big amount of saving).
Nevertheless, she never drown into luxurious life she can afford (in some measures for Jakarta dwellers). Her biggest dream is to travel around the world. Well, classic it may sounds, but that's what her saving is for. She went to Germany once and has made Berlin her starting point to conquer the earth.
The most enjoyable aunty she is.
I dance with her, I laugh and mock people with her (I mock her, she mocks me), I wander the city with her (and got lost in that cobble stones jungle) and daydream while eating ice scream with her. Where to borrow money, where to sleep, where to ask for help is unquestionably her.
And above all she always has this combination of stoicalness while at the same time she exhibits capacity to treasure all the fun, all the downs and ups, all the pains. Any certain condition as worst as it gets, as good as it gets, never gets the best of her.
I wonder if it's related to her being the youngest of 9. She was born when my mom reached age 18. I bet she was exposed to a hell amount of growing up issues of her 5 sisters and 3 brothers, ranging from teenage drama queens to that foolish hormonal lunatic songs of my uncles. So she used to play around alone.
Just like last week, when she text messaged me:
"Kla, how are you? We get series of blackouts here. I was just visited by Jehovah's witness, so I told him/her I wanted to go on some business. But I don't know where to go now. The class is on holiday hahahahaha"
and I replied "Repent, you sinner!! hahahahaha. O y I'll be having TOTAL 1st interview, long way to France.Pray for me, will y?"
and she replied with her stoic tune as always," Yup, I bet there are many sins written on my face. I always pray for you -see I'm already repent-. Got to go now, heading for nowhere"
She once told me, she came from a land above the sky - a sky country, a sky kingdom-. Part of me didn't believe it, but other part want to know the story. So I listened to her own made fairy tale (I even asked, is drink jar in sky country different from what we have here on earth?).
and I guess she has taken me believe that she came from a land above the sky.
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