A story about a beancurd seller

He has six other siblings, three sisters and three brothers. Of all his siblings, he is the only survivor. The boys are all unique in their own ways. The eldest boy had an identity crisis and didn't really have much of a career until he passed away. The second boy liked a carefree life full of adventures. He would be gone missing for days, weeks or months without the family even knowing his whereabout. His younger brother liked an easy relaxing life and spent most of his time playing badminton or gone fishing at the nearby creek. He was the only one among the boys who was serious in supporting the family earning a living by making and selling beancurd (tempe) on a push bike every single day. 

He woke up before the sunrise, cycled for kilometres away to deliver the tempe. He was serious and diligent in what he was doing. Even after coming back from all the rounds delivering tempe, he still had the energy to do the house chores. 

His life changed when he was drafted in a police force and got posted in a place far away from his home town and family. It took him almost ten years before he could go back to visit his parents and family again. 

He was quite smart and moved up the rank quite smoothly from being a soldier out in the field to be promoted as an administration staff handling posts that require focus, attention to details and analytical skills. 

In his career, he was quite an honest person. Two posts that he held proved that. The first position was as a head of his military company cooperative, turning the unit from a continuously inflicting loss cooperative to record profits by the time he handed over the position to someone else. Similarly, when he headed the logistic unit managing all the rice stocks for his corp members, he flipped the unit from continuously-deficit unit to a unit that had a reserve rice stock at the end of each year. 

One day, because of his performance and honesty, he was assigned by his commander to audit his own friend who was corrupt when leading the logistic unit after him. An experience that he didn't enjoy but had to do because of a direct command from his company commander. 

He planned his future well. He decided not to pursue a commander career path but invested in building a house to protect his family after his retirement. He didn't want to end up like his peers, he said, who had to live in the barrack years after retirement for not owning a home. 

That's a brief story of my father. He is now 78 years old, the only survivor of his siblings and also one of two last survivors of his platoon who got posted in Kupang back in1965. 

I thought I wrote about him now because he is now living on a borrowed time from God. I pray that God still gives him many more years to be with us though. 

The passing of my father in law recently taught me now to cherish those we care because we don't know how much time left that we still have them with us, or for how long we still live in this world and be with them. 

My father has many qualities in him. He is smart, he lives an honest life despite all the temptations to be corrupt and he tries to be fair to people. He is a good provider and wise in managing his finance. As a pensioner, he accumulates saving much more than his peers would have. 

However, he also has other parts of him that I am not fond of. He is a proud man and live strictly to how he sees the world. He would be agitated and even angry, when things are not going according to his expectations of how things should be. The ideals in his mind and how people views of him are important. He held grudges to all the bitter experience he had in the past and the hurtful things that people had once said to him or about him, even long after all these people had died. His attitude then caused him to be antisocial, and being excluded from his circle of friends and even our family and relatives. He lives a solitary life at home with my mother and sister, driving them crazy with all his antiques every single day. 

I have now come to terms with who he is, have accepted and loved him with all his limitations. I'm grateful and blessed to have him, despite all his weaknesses. I know without him, I wouldn't be able to live the life that I have now. All his good and bad examples have somehow affected how I make decisions in life. 

Thank you Bapak, I hope you would continue to be all healthy still and annoy us for more years to come. 





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