Happy Belated Birthday Eesok

Dutch-oom
French-oncle
German-Onkel
Greek-θείος
Italian-zio
Portuguese/spanish-tío
Russian-дядюшка
Cantonese-Sok

Dear Steven;

   I would like to think that Dad and I have been good influences in your life. It is so very important that you have people that you look up to, people you know who love and support you, people who have made an impact on the shape of the mold that formed you.

   Let me tell you about your Eesok-kung, my Eesok... a major diecasting element in my life.

   Eesok means "2nd Uncle" in Cantonese. He is my father's brother, not to be confused with Eefu which means "2nd Uncle (mother's brother)" Eesok-kung is therefore, your great-uncle on your maternal paternal side. And yes, he is a GREAT uncle.

   My earliest memories of Eesok are with his old black bicycle. Eesok used to ride to our house from his house on his rickety one-speed black bicycle. He was a college student living with his parents. He perched me atop the support bar and together, we rode back to my grand-parents' house. And there, he created a wonderland playground for an enthralled young child. We drew faces on our thumbs and had "finger and thumb" conversations. He taught me how to rub my head with one hand in one direction and my tummy with my other hand in the other direction at the same time. And when you listened carefully to his tummy, you would discover a whole new alien world where they spoke in growls and clicks and musical rumblings and hysterical burps. We laughed at each other's stories and jokes. We played word games. My favourite were homophones: words that sound alike but differ in meaning, e.g. son vs. sun, hair vs. hare, pray vs. prey... you get the idea.

   In later years, your Auntie Sue and Uncle Leonard were also included in these special Eesok outings. He graduated with an engineering degree and started a successful career working for George Kent (Malaysia ) Berhad. He shared his newfound affluence with us. Our special outings together now included trips to A&W for foot-long hot dogs and root beer floats. And every outing almost always ended with a trip to the convenience store to buy Beano and Dandy comic books and Smarties chocolate candy before he took us home.

   Eesok loves to read and subsequently nurtured my love for reading. He must have bought us hundreds of books: Enid Blyton's Famous Five and The Magic Faraway Tree series were my favourites, followed closely by the Nancy Drew series. I must have read every one of them, thanks to Eesok. In my teenage years, I started to read his hand-me-downs. I think I read Jacqueline Susann's Valley of the Dolls when I was 14 or 15; the story of three young women who embark on careers that bring them to the dizzying heights of fame and eventual self-destruction with sex, drugs and alcohol. Not entirely appropriate teenage reading material. But I also read works of the "Great Ones"... Alex Haley, Pearl S. Buck and John Steinbeck. All because Eesok had read them.

  I so wish that you had the opportunity to get to know your Eesok-kung. I wish that he and I were not so geographically inaccessible to each other. I miss him. I miss his dry humor. And his ready laugh. And his ability to make me laugh.

  But I can raise my glass of Cabernet and wish him well... Happy Birthday Eesok. May you have many many happy years ahead of you. Thank you for the many many happy years that I had because of you.

   So dear Steven, I hope you find your own "Eesok." We all need one to love and to look up to.

Love,
Mom