We had a total of 5 people, too many to stay in the ward and so we slept on the benches outside the wards. My eldest sister went back with my mum first then the rest of us left at about 630am after informing my father.
I proceed to school for an early breakfast, felt a burning sensation from my stomach liver area due to little sleep. And then I attended the last lecture of transition metals and biomolecules (BM). BM released early and I immediately felt hungry and grabbed my lunch. Met up with JY to prepare for the last thing to do in school-presentation. After the presentation I would be officially done with the continuous assignments for the semester and left with 3 exams to conquer only.
If my phone were to ring before the presentation, I can only say sorry and will chiong down to the hospital. But luckily, it did not happen if not JY and alex would have to handle more load from the presentation.
Did not manage to answer one of the questions given by the lecturer, richard wong, anything other than that I feel our presentation is alright. JY and alex thought I should feel very happy about finally done with the presentation but I didn't because I had something more worrying felt within me.
About 330pm, I was told to cab down to the hospital though I wanted to take public transport there. But my eldest sister feel it may be anytime because every time we looked at him, his breathing got weaker. So I cabbed down, met with problems with the payment of cab fare. The taxi's net machine can't work and in the end I resort to pay with my credit card. Additional of a dollar or so was charged using credit card to pay! But no choice, didn't have enough cash with me and I needed to rush to the ward.
It was before 5pm, the start of the visiting hours and so need to register with the security counter in order to enter. I was forced to say out the reason that the patient may go anytime before the lady was willing to register for me. I know the visiting hours start from 5pm onwards; if i had a choice I would enter after 5pm.
I went in and all were present already, including my eldest sister's boyfriend. The nurse told us that my father could hear us because when the nurse was applying some moisturizer onto my dad's lips, his lips actually moved, responded to the nurse.
I had some things to say to him before his departure but did not have the courage to do it because I would break down when I say those words. Then in the end my eldest sister suggested that we all take turns to say something to him. I wanted to talk to him alone because I wasn't sure if I would be the only one to break down. But in the end, all broke down, except for the guys.
And I finally said out the words that I want to tell him. "爸爸,谢谢你把我养大. 你要好好的上路喔,"
Only my mum refused to have anything said to my father at that moment. After we all the younger generation said what we have to say, we left my mum alone with my dad. We were sure she had something to tell him at least.
Then my uncle came, took a looked at him told him he was here and we left home for dinner. Had our dinner in the market and then all of them went home to rest (sleep). Except for me, I dared not sleep because I know the moment I sleep, I do not know when I would wake up because I would want to be beside my father throughout this night. Like what the doctors said, he really will go anytime and I just wished to have been with him for his last part of journey.
Only my second sister mentioned that she wanted to be in the hospital as well throughout the night and so I waited for her to wake up to go to the hospital. While they were sleeping, I was trying to complete the last assignment, the MIDI file.
Had problems here and there creating the MIDI file, nearly fell asleep because seriously too tired and no better ideas to do it. Then suddenly a reasonable part of sounds heard and I was awake already. Did like half of the music piece, left the remaining half to complete, about 12 seconds left to complete a minimum of 20 seconds MIDI file.
After last night's stay at the hospital, we were more prepared to make ourselves comfortable in the hospital, especially this time we were going to stay inside the ward which is very cold. I brought a cushion with me in the bag to be as my pillow.
We board cab before the midnight to avoid midnight charges and reached the ward close to midnight, 12am. My second sister said that she felt those "dirty" stuff may come to harass my dad during this night and so she brought along some water soaked with a plant to ward off those evils by spraying the water around my father's bed and and a player playing the buddhist scripts to prevent those "dirty" stuff from nearing my father.
We do not know if my father has offended anybody before so did all this to let him have some peace at his last of his journey.
Then we realized his heart beat on the monitor was around 170 beats (pulses)! We observed for a few minutes but it maintained around 160. So high! Then I went to call for nurses and they said that he may be in pain so causing the high heart beat rate. His heart beat went down after they purged him with the strong pain killer, fentanyl.
The next moment he was having a bit of fever. So the nurse put a cold pad on his forehead to bring his temperature down. I see that his condition somewhat stabilized and I said I needed the sleep. So i went to sleep. We got 3 chairs put around his bed and my chair was the most inner one, barely having some space to spread my legs but nevertheless, i slept for about 2 hours before I woke up in shock.
Due to discomfort from the improper sleeping position, I woke up opening my eyes sometimes to view at my father in case my sister and her husband were sleeping too soundly also. It turned out that my second sister did not sleep at all because the cold pad on my father's forehead kept dropping down to his face and so my sister had been helping him to bring the cold pad back to his forehead.
Then once, I saw my sister actually went over to the opposite side of me, the other side of the bed to adjust the cold pad. I wondered why she was standing there, was it because something was happening to my dad?
I stood up with half barely opened eyes and the next moment my father's eyes were in contact with me like before. His eyes were temporarily "concious". His eyes were in contact with my sister first, then his head was turned and he looked at me. The next moment his whole body were shaking as if he was on a vibrator. I immediately dashed out to alert the nurses. My sister meanwhile told my father that "Don't worry, we are here. Relax. Nurses are coming.". According to my sister he tried to control his shaking movements.
We went out and let the nurses to handle with curtains drawn. Shortly, we went back and he was able to close his mouth after hearing us. We then realized he could response to us. I then quickly called my eldest sister who was waiting at home after she woke up around 2plus am to ask them to rush down quickly.
While my eldest sister and mum were rushing down, my second sister and I talked to him to ensure of his response and not fabricating tales to my eldest sister and mum.
I asked him if he knew my uncle was down to see him this evening. He closed his mouth. I asked him if he knew my eldests sister boyfriend was here to see him. He closed his mouth again. I asked them if he knew my brother in law was here too. He closed his mouth as well. But soon this movement (responding time) got slower.
I asked him to wait for 大姐 and mummy can or not? He responded. Then I also siezed the chance to ask him about his funeral. I asked if he wants to do Taoist style of funeral, no response. Then asked for Buddhist style, he responded.
We were shocked because we are considered to be Taoist. But now he wanted to do Buddhist style. I dared not asked any further for any enquiry about his funeral because my eldest sister upon hearing this, she could not believe and its better for her to witness herself that my dad had not response if to do Taoist style of funeral. She even said that we do not know how to ask questions. Fine. Let her see the result for herself. We did not make any tales of anything. We merely just reported what we see.
I asked my father if he has heard what we told him during the evening. He responded. Okay, I have told him what I really wanted to say and he heard it. :)
My eldest sister and mum finally arrived. My eldest sister confirmed the fact that he wanted to do Buddhist style. But my sister explained to him that we can't because he wasnt into vegetarian and then asked him if Taoist style if okay. He responded.
My eldest sister voiced out our regrets to him. One, we couldnt bring him home in time. Two, we did not bring him to other countries for holidays. I held his right hand and my eldest sister held his left hand throughout the last part of conversation. He responded to every of our sentences with quite a bit of lag time because he was getting weaker and weaker already.
We watched him with his breathing rate started to decrease. After each breathing I would thought that would be last breathing, but it did not for quite a few times. And finally, he did not breathe anymore.
The nurses came in first to see and they called for doctor. A female doctor came and said that there is still pulses felt, his heart is still beating. Then they pushed in an equipment to check for pulses and finally fullstop. An Indian doctor came and announced to us.
The nurses helped him to change into the clothes we brought for him. My eldest sister called our cousin who is in this business and the preparation for his wake started. Two colleagues came to collect his body and pushed down to the mortuary. We followed to get some admin procedures down.
My eldest sister stayed back to get his death certificate at the emergency department after we were issued with the doctor's verification of his death. The rest of us went home to rest for awhile and waited for my eldest sister to be back to brief us on what we had to do.
