Crossroad between the choppy waves and serene fields

A love story worth cherishing

"Why can't you get it right? Until you finish playing the complete piece no playing the devices， the little boy sulk as Kay's Aunt reprimanded his nephew for not being able to finish up his music assignment correctly"
"Ma I'm tired, I want to rest for a bit"
"No 2 more times! You exam is in 3 days so you need to get it right"

And the boy quietly goes back to his piano as soon as his Aunt left to the Kitchen closing off the iPad, Kay watched as little Ren Li played but the kid was also getting frustrated himself after playing the wrong notes.

He slams at the piano, "I don't want to play anymore!" And stomp his feet towards the sofa. Kay felt for the boy, it reminded him of his younger days when he would push himself to play 2-3 hours every day until he master his violin / piano / guitar piece perfectly and when he can't get it right he would get frustrated too. And so this is the constant pressure of being in a family where everything needs to be perfect and competitive. His Aunt is a perfectionist somewhat demanding yet very successful as a woman entrepreneur running her own boutique fashion and clothes line.

"Ah Xia, so kind of you to visit, please pass this back to your parents and Ah Ma and and Ah Kong. I bought these from my recent trip"

Kay's aunt another entrepreneur, single mother. Her husband passed away when they were 5 years into marriage and she had just delivered Ren Li. Very strong person to be able to raise a son on her own and yet setup her business. It's been 15 years now that uncle passed away and she never fails to remember him on selected days. When I was younger as my mum would bring me over to play with Ren Li as Aunt stays alone with Ren Li and the maid after my uncle passed away. A sad but moving story was told to me by my mum. It wasn't until when i was about 15 that during one of my visit, she personally shared her story with me. My uncle is of Japanese decent, it was one of my grandpa's client son. They met as my grandpa meets this Japanese client almost once a month and on one of his visit, his son came along, he bumped into my aunt at the corridor of the house. It was love at first sight.

"Your uncle was very persistent, he courted and ask for my hand in marriage from your grandpa when i just turned 19, 6 months after we met" Your grandpa insisted that I finished my education hence we were deeply in love through letters. We had many dreams that we spoke about we wanted to have a family that he had shared the things he wanted to do together. So much going but sometimes too much planning may not be worth it, I'd rather live each day fulfillingly. But then again on the contrarily we did live each day to the fullest. On his final days, he felt sad that he could not be there for us and see Ren Li growing up, graduating, getting married and having kids but he had never regretted each day we had since we met"

My mum told me my grandfather objected to the wedding at first but relented to it, he tried to keep my Aunt away by sending her to boarding school during her university days but he gave up after seeing how deeply in love is she with my uncle. My mum said my grandpa threaten to disown my Aunt if she refuses to break-off the relationship but she stood strongly, she was kneeling down in front of our house when my grandpa told her to leave and ask the maid to pack her clothes and threw it out of the house. It wasn't until my grandmother intervene that grandpa stop. My grandma knew my Aunt love this man very much but my grandpa wanted to use her hand in marriage for bridging a business partnership which is really of old school. I felt it reminds me of the ancient historical days where marriages were kept for bridging relationship with countries and exchanges of favours.

Since then my grandma had been very careful keeping an eye on us, often lecturing my cousins parents and mine especially so that they watch over us, not to get involved in relationship unnecessarily I guess it was because of the fear of seeing your loved one suffers. My uncle passing was a great blow for my aunt - it took awhile before she could accept it but also because she had to think and live for Ren Li, and she is very strict with Ren Li probably because she wants him to grow up well, the only memory left of her husband, a love child that was left from this relationship. She would light a little water lantern on certain days for him still.