Adoption - the Woos.

 

When the Woos were told by a social worker that an unwed mother is about to give birth in two months, and they do not know the baby’s gender, and having told them that, was asked, would they be keen to adopt? They said yes immediately. That was 13 years ago. 

The Woos have one biological son. They always wanted two to three kids. Mrs Woo, 44, a marketing officer, said: “We have always felt we have the capacity and resources to have a bigger family to care for.” Her husband, 47, is a chief financial officer. 

Of course, Mr Woo needed some convincing. He said: “My kid was already eight years old by then and we were comfortable. It wasn’t an easy decision for me.”

But what tip the scale for the man of the household was this consideration: -

“When I meet my Creator - I have been blessed with so much and if I’m asked, “When you had an opportunity to change a life, why didn’t you take it?”, I wouldn’t be able to answer.”

The Woos are Christians and when they took their baby son home, Mrs Woo said: “The first time I saw him, I was just so moved with love for him. There was no doubt in my mind that I had made the right decision.”

Mr Woo said that his elder son is in love with his little brother (adopted son). “They plan to tell the younger child about his adoption as soon as he is able to comprehend it.” 

He said: “It has been awesome so far. He has been such a blessing, being so much joy and love to us.”

FYI, the Woos have tried for a second child for years and ”went through three cycles of in-vitro fertilisation unsuccessfully.”

Lesson? One. 

Well, I am glad the Woos said yes to the opportunity to change a life, and it changed their lives too, including their son’s life. 

I can imagine the blessing are mutual for them, from adopted son to their family and from their family to adopted son. From day one, they merged to become one family, that is, a synthesis of manifold blessings for a family with the capacity and resources to care for the additional bundle of joy. 

Alas, everyone is inspired by a journey of many happy endings, especially when it is a journey about building relationships with unconditional love and hope. 

Indeed, for those whose faith tells them that when they cross the liminal line of mortality, they will be held accountable for the things they have done and have not done, it just adds to their conscience one additional consideration for living a life of meaning and enduring purpose. 

As an aside, it is interesting to note the difference between meaning and purpose. I googled it, and this came up: “...meaning (logos) is how something or someone is defined, as well as an intention or reason for doing something; while purpose (telos) is the fulfillment or consummation of the meaning. One intends, the other accomplishes”.

In other words, your meaning is the “why” you do something, or the specific reason for that choice, and your purpose is to ask yourself: “What am I here for?” It is an overarching reason for living. 

By finding your purpose, you breathe meaning to your decision or choices. They do overlap in significant ways, of course, one influencing the other, but I see purpose as broader in scope and depth. 

Now, I can imagine someone defining their purpose as self-directed, that is, they are here on earth to gain the most material riches through industry and determination. Thereafter, every decision in line with that purpose brings about meaning to their life. 

For the Woos, however, the meaning is captured in the decision to adopt. Its purpose is the opportunity to change a life, to impact the life for good. As such, the purpose for them is others-directed, and that decision is meaningful to them, a blessing that is mutual no less. 

As such, meaning and purpose, when it comes to us as human beings, is premised both on the social and the metanarrative. Social is horizontal, that is, it is about building relationships, and the metanarrative is where the purpose comes in, upon which we are inspired and emboldened to fulfill that meaning. That is the case for the Woos. 

Of course, the true test of love is that it is unconditional, and I know of some parents whose child (with developmental issues) and actions have brought them to the edge of insanity and back. Their meaning and purpose were put through the fiery furnace of parenthood, and for some of them, they came out of it even stronger, with a love overcoming even the toughest trials of their life. 

Be that as it may, the Woos is right to confront their purpose in life, putting their faith in the metanarrative of “I am here on earth to take every opportunity to change a life,” and that chariot-led their decision to adopt, a choice that gave them unsurpassed meaning and joy. 

That is a lesson in parenthood we will all benefit from, and occasionally, we will need such timely reminder, in particular, when embracing our own child.

 

Gangtang's 27 years' search for his son.

 

I wonder, what does it take to feel like a father for some of us?

Well, for Guo Gangtang, 51, it took him 24 years of searching for his son, riding on his motorbike, and covering more than 500,000 across China. Yes, 24 years of unrelenting search, you heard it right. 

In 1997, Guo Zhen (Xinzhen) was abducted in front of the family home in Shandong, “where he was playing unattended...Traffickers snatched the boy and sold him to a family in central China.” He was only 2.5 years old then. 

Guo Zhen, now 26, was found via a DNA test and that ended Gangtang’s 24 years search, where he quit his job, “and criss-crossed the country on a motorbike with large flags bearing his son’s photo tied to the back.”

It is reported that “since launching a DNA database of missing family members in 2016, police said they have helped more than 2,600 individuals kidnapped as children – some more than 60 years ago – to find their biological parents.”

Mind you, the father’s search for his boy had garnered much nationwide and worldwide attention. Andy Lau even starred in a movie about Gangtang’s 24-year quest titled “Lost and Love.” 

Andy played Gangtang. And Andy was “extremely happy and inspired” to hear the news that Gangtang had found his son.It was a tear-soaking moment for Gangtang and his wife, when they hugged their son, who is now a teacher living in central province Henan. 

Gangtang exclaimed: “Now the child has been found, everything can only be happy from now on.”

It is also reported that “across the years, Guo has helped seven other families find their lost children and raised awareness about child trafficking – still a taboo topic in China.”

Lesson? One.

China’s one child policy has taken its toll on the soul of millions of parents. It has also resulted in untold pain to grieving mothers who have to standby to watch their own newborn daughter being put to death or abandoned, just so that the tradition of having a son to carry the family name would be realised, by hook, crook, or worse, infanticide. 

What’s more, by 2020, the gender imbalance was unthinkable, with 30 to 40 million surplus men. That is more than five times the population here. “In China at the time of the policy shifted to two-child policy, a staggering 119 boys were born for every 100 girls.” (The global average is 105 boys to every 100 girls). 

I write about this Nemo-like search for one’s son this morning because I can’t imagine the depth of love and devotion Gangtang had for his son, that is, in the 24 years of searching for him. He once told the Chinese media this: “Only by hitting the road looking for my son, do I feel I am a father.” 

Imagine giving up a quarter of a century of your life to embark on this quest, putting your son’s face on a flag, and travelling more than 500,000 km, without even knowing whether your baby (you knew for only 2.5 years) could ever be found. 

Imagine even further another love - if love is the right word. This time the love of another “father” who had bought your abducted son for a price and then raising him up as his very own, caring for him over the next 24 years, presumably hiding the truth from him, and refusing to come to terms with the real possibility that you as his biological father have never given up looking for him, travelling all over China, having to battle highway robbers, sleeping under bridges and even begging when your money ran out, just so as to fulfill that one wish to reunite with your only son. 

Well, juxtapositioning the two ironies together makes for such fact-is-stranger-than-fiction reality that my mind (as a father myself) cannot fully wrap around, can you? 

At this poignant moment, I came across the words of author Li Yiyun: -

“Being a mother (or father) must be the saddest yet the most hopeful thing in the world, falling into a love that, once started would never end.”

Indeed, some love is forever. Amidst the unspeakable pain is the unspeakable joy of a hope that never dies. 

Truly, I am so glad Gangtang and his son have reunited. And as he said, ““Only by hitting the road looking for my son, do I feel I am a father.” 

He is one father who never really knew his son, never saw the various milestones of growth in his young life, and was never able to touch and hug him to say “I love you so much”. In fact, that journey he took was the closest thing to fatherhood to him. And sadly, his son will never fully understand that love that never dies, but was nevertheless a love that inspired many fathers (and mothers) to never take their own child for granted. 

It is a love that reminded us daily as fathers that we should always treasure our journey with our kid, because it is a journey not solely of the imagination and hope, but one where we are fortunate enough to witness, embrace and celebrate every critical crossroad of their growth and overcoming, as one family.

 

Father Day (2021)

 

Dad knows best. Sometimes they really do. They see a need in their child, they become their rescuers. A father’s heart indeed beats with unconditional love. 

ST celebrates Father’s Day today with that theme. We have a father who gave up everything in 2014 for his son, Nathanael (Nat). Chris’ son was diagnosed with global developmental delay with low muscles tone. He researched about it and it was suggested that “living in a cool, temperate climate would be better” for Nat. 

So, Chris, who has a PhD in biology, uprooted to New Zealand with family, left a well paying job and sold his company, to care for his son full time. 

Chris said: “I made a choice: Should I be a millionaire and my son is bedridden, or should I be a poor man and my son can be perfectly fine? So I took the second option.”

Well, all that paid rich dividends for Chris. Nat is doing well. At 11 today, he has obtained a diploma in written music theory from Trinity College London’s music exam board and scored distinctions for some GCSE subjects. 

Another dad became a stay-home father for his children. He has been playing that role since 2008. He said it was the most rewarding time of his life; watching his children grow, bonding with them, as he ferried them to school in his bicycle. 

Nor Nizar Mohamed was in fact questioned for a such a move. One day, he recalled that he brought his son to play badminton. His friend asked, why he bring him over. “If you take care of him, what is your wife doing?” That was something he as a stay home dad has to deal with. 

Another dad was inspired by his own father to step up. Albert Lim’s father died when he was 33. He recalled his father fondly. Though a stoic man, he had a high sense of responsibility and was caring. “I miss his quiet caring touch unto my family.”

Albert is a volunteer with Families for Life, and a Life council member and board director at the Centre For Fathering. His own children are married and he has a granddaughter. It was a long journey of fatherhood for Albert and it is ongoing until you heave your last breath. 

Lesson? One. 

I recall E.M. Forster once said, "How do I know who I am until I see what I do?" That’s wise. 

We are defined by our actions, and I believe as fathers, we are also redeemed by them. Fatherhood is a redeeming journey. We take the first step by seeing ourselves in our child. 

We may think their struggles to crawl, to walk, and to talk differ from ours. We may think they are just beginning to live, while we are at a much later stage of that development. 

Yet, the reality is that their struggles are no different from ours. One is the birth of a life, the other, the birth of being a father. There is distinct newness on both sides as we cradle our child in our arms. We are both fragile in our own ways. The baby being nurtured and the father’s soul reformed through offering nurturance. 

And the redemption part comes when we gradually form our own identity with every step (or misstep) taken along the way. 

For that reason, both of us are learning. Both of us are growing. And both of us are adapting. That’s fatherhood, a mutually influencing and reinforcing journey from father to child, and from child to father. 

Let me end with the words of a Roman emperor, which for me describes fatherhood well.

"Some people, when they do someone a favor, are always looking for a chance to call it in. And some aren't, but they're still aware of it - still regard it as a debt. But others don't even do that. They're like a vine that produces grapes without looking for anything in return...after helping others...They just go on to something else...We should be like that." (Marcus Aurelius).

Fathers are like vines, and their labour of love asks for nothing in return; just the well-being of his child. And grapes when they are not ripe are sour, and father and child go through that journey a lot. There will surely be disappointments, stumbles and falls, even rebellion. 

That’s where the true testing comes, in line with what EM Foster said, “"How do I know who I am until I see what I do?" For when father and child overcome, one battle of growth after another, your vision of fatherhood comes into greater clarity; your identity as a father emerges from the overcoming. 

Before long, you will know who you really are, especially during such time when your child comes to you and says, “I love you, Dad.”

 

Bill and Melinda Gates - Divorce.

 

First it was the richest couple, Jeff Bezos and MacKenzie Scott in 2019. Now, it is the fourth richest couple, Bill and Melinda Gates. Yes, you’ve heard. They are divorcing; in modernspeak, it’s decoupling. 

The Bezos marriage lasted about 25 years. The Gates union lasted about 27 years. The former have four adult kids and the latter (Gates) have 3 adult kids, the youngest is 18. 

Billionaires do get divorce you know. They are emotional beings too. They vacillate between love and hate, envy and contentment, sorrow and joy too. Like the Beatles song says, “Money can’t buy me love.” 

Wealth or fame, or both, does not provide lifelong innoculation. Akin to the covid vaccination, you either adapt or change in a marriage. For the Bezos and Gates, well, they change. Some marriages endure, others just end. 

Bill (65) and Melinda (56) may be a match from day one, marrying in 1994, with symmetrical goals to make the world a better place, but personal vows are not always made for a lifetime. There’s no guarantee in this world. 

“Over the last 27 years, we have raised three incredible children and built a foundation that works all over the world to enable all people to lead healthy, productive lives.” The statement they both released on Monday reads. 

“We continue to share a belief in that mission and will continue our work together at the foundation, but we no longer believe we can grow together as a couple in the next phrase of our lives.”

“We ask for space and privacy for our family as we begin to navigate this new life.” 

Together, as a couple for the last 27 years, they have led in a grand vision to make the world a place where many find hope and live out their dreams. Their Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation has pumped in more than $36b between 1994 and 2018. The foundation has over $51b in assets.

 

Just last year alone, during the Covid-19 pandemic, they have given out some $1.75b to vaccine initiatives and research. 

After the split, they said that the work of the foundation is likely to go on. Bill said: “This is not some small family foundation that’s going to fall apart because a marriage is falling apart.”

I wish them all the best that lifelong friendship bestows. The fact that they remain friends, and responsible parents to their children is what is most redeeming about their 27-year union. 

Lesson? Well, not really a lesson, but a statement that I hope this is not going to be a trend - whether as an subtle encouragement to cut the knot or discouragement to tie the knot.

Mind you, rich people are trailblazers. And the Bezos and Gates wield great worldly influence because in terms of achievements, whether financial, technology and philanthropy, they serve as examples for others to emulate. A shining city on the hill, the gatekeepers and trendsetters of society. 

In a joint petition filed to dissolve their marriage, they cited that their union was “irretrievably broken”. I know divorces. As a family lawyer, I have attended weddings where love is prepared to overcome all. For it is all in their eyes, that is, the way they look at each other. The eyes are the window to the soul, the doorway to the heart. 

When the eyes lock in warm embrace, holding the champagne glasses before a crowd of witnesses, you can feel the radiance of a new commitment on a journey that may, for some, turn out to be more experimental than covenantal. That journey is however reflected in the soul of their eyes. It glows. It’s shared vision. It takes hold. 

But, in the office when you see the eyes of someone who has finally mustered the courage to file for divorce, a decision not lightly made, the eyes are almost lifeless. It’s tired, jaded. It’s pained, expressionless. 

Overcoming love had somehow been overwhelmed. And the last straw that broke the back is not so much in the weight of the straw, but it is in the back that has given up long time ago. Emotional divorce indeed precedes legal divorce. And the eyes tell more than what the ink on paper can ever express. 

So I can imagine what Bill and Melinda, not as billionaires but human beings, have gone through. Imagine having so much in common as husband and wife, and both so devoted to nurturing three grown up kids, while at the same time, having built a philanthropic empire that aims to transform lives all over the world, yet, hearts joined in fulfilling responsibilities could not remain joined for marriage. Like water droplets, the years hide an erosion that no one had anticipated. 

Their sad state of the union is captured in their joint statement - “we no longer believe we can grow together as a couple in the next phrase of our live.” Indeed there is no guarantee in life. 

I started the lesson by saying that I hope this doesn’t become a trend. For each marriage is like a fingerprint - no two of them are alike. Personalities differ. Circumstances differ. Life-paths of couples differ too.

 

At times, staying together requires couples to fight together, and not each other. You are therefore accountable to the love you have promised to another. You may not be as rich or famous as the Gates, but everyday is a choice in your marital journey, a personal choice that all adds up. 

And news of a famous breakup is not an excuse for you to claim that a lifelong marriage is a myth. It ought to challenge you to believe that the choices you make make the difference. Anything that is lifelong requires a lifetime commitment. 

Let me end with a marital advice from a famous couple too. He was asked - “What would you say is the secret to a long and happy marriage?”

He replied: “First of all, we accommodate each other. There was nothing we fundamentally disagreed on. She knew knew my quirks and I knew her eccentricities.” 

Like Bill and Melinda Foundation, they too have laid the cornerstone of a foundation, being equal-partners in a marriage with three adult children. They are Lee Kuan Yew and his lifelong partner, Kwa Geok Choo. 

And like I said, there’s no guarantee. Yet, whether a marriage is experimental or covenantal, the only guarantee is in the choices we make, one day at a time.

 

Monogamy is a demanding discipline.

It was a marriage of 30 years. They have two grown up sons. She is 56 and he is 54. They were both working in the civil service. 

She was 18 when she joined and she was working as a technician. It was reported that “throughout the years, her career had remained stagnant so that her husband’s could thrive, noted the judge. Her promotions were delayed because she had to care for the family.”

In 2017, she filed for divorce. It was on his unreasonable behaviour. “Such behaviour included the husband requesting the wife to accept his mistress into the family and into the matrimonial home which the wife agreed to,” noted the Judge. 

Yes, you read it right. It is not that uncommon. Some spouses bring their mistresses back home. Some are done in secret; others in the open. Still others ask for some permanent arrangement of blissful co-existence. While marriage covenants are exclusive, adultery (in some cases) is inclusive yet often unilateral in favour of the dominant spouse, that is, the husband usually gets the final say in such arrangement. 

Mind you, I have done divorces where, in a small 3-room HDB flat, the husband and his mistress(es) conducted their trysts in the master bedroom while his wedded wife and kids are squeezed into the other available room. I could still remember what the wife told me, quite nonchalantly: “they are very inconsiderate...sometimes at night they are noisy and my kids just can’t sleep.”

Alas, in most cases, the matrimonial bed is the bellwether of the health or the future of the marriage. It is supposed to be exclusive, and that is what the marriage vows have delineated for the couple before a crowd of witnesses. It seemed believable enough then.

But, in practice, especially when one party ages over time and the other party starts to wonder whether he has gotten the short end of the marital stick in a world so full of enticing options and endless opportunities for self-gratification, a sheen of cold wax soon starts to form around the edges of one’s restless heart. A marriage whose heart is unguarded often takes off at the slightest agitation of lust and self-devotion. 

The husband in that case was said to be confounded with the wife’s application for divorce. “The husband claimed in these proceedings that the wife was happy with this arrangement and was surprised she had cited this as a reason for the divorce,” observed the judge. 

In a bid to have his bed and sleep on it, the husband sought his wife’s consent in 2014. Well, she reluctantly agreed. 

But honestly, I too am confounded. I wonder, why do you bother pursuing an agreement when it is wholly one-sided? If there ought to be mutuality in agreements, would the husband readily accept it if the table is reversed? Indeed, some agreements are so devoid of self-awareness that it makes a mockery of a gentleman’s handshake. 

In any event, I am sure it is a conscience pact, one in which the husband gets to do what he wanted without keeping it under wraps. Somehow, the pleasure derived from lust under the covers is nowhere near the pleasure arrived at when such liaison is held in the open with a conscience naively mollified. 

The forbidden fruit may yield a juicy bite when taken in sheer darkness, but over time, it is the borrowed light of self-righteousness that holds a greater draw. And like the lust of a man’s heart, legitimacy in whatever form that one can secure compels him to a pact of betrayal under the guise of forced approval. 

At times, it goes beyond self-righteousness to a marital schemer manipulating the terms he wants, almost akin to an agreement that is secured under duress. 

Let me end with this inconvenient truth. In a sexually exclusive union, I have no delusions about the ideal as spelt out in the marriage vows. We are human after all, enfleshed in our own wayward desires. For whose mind in the course of marriage doesn’t wander to uncharted territory where the juiciest fruit are laid bare for the plucking? 

Monogamy is a demanding discipline, of the mind, of the soul and of the heart. When two souls intertwine, when they make a promise to each other before loved ones, the integrity of the union comes not from some ideal floating in the air. No, it instead comes from a lifelong discipline to subject one’s freedom to choose to advance only one’s pleasure for the freedom to choose to fortify what is the pleasure of a lifetime covenant.

That pleasure is beyond the lusts of one’s desires. It is beyond a momentary fling. It is a pleasure that does not outgrow the promise of the union. It in fact nurtures it. It grows stronger with age because it draws its resilience from time. And it comes with a price. It’s the price of enduring love. 

Not all can afford to pay it though. Or want to.

 

Caleb Tan and Pastor Philip Chan - Father to the Fatherless.

Caleb Tan, 46, never knew his own father. He said: “I didn’t know who my own father was. I had never experienced a father’s love.” 

He had a traumatic past. He had always felt he was born unloved. In the papers today, Lee Siew Hua reports: “(Caleb) had not only served time, but had also fled to the Philippines to escape court charges, divorced his first wife, a Filippina, and later attempted suicide.”

Caleb had also thought his mother was dead. But at 12, when he needed to apply for identity card, his grandmother (who was his sole caregiver) placed a newspaper advertisement to trace her. Caleb said: “I hated my mum a lot. Why did she give birth to me if she didn’t want me?”

Never knowing a father’s or mother’s love, Caleb spent his time in nightclubs. Before long, he was involved in fights and spent 10 years behind bars for drug dealing and other crimes. 

After he served his time, he made his way to The Hiding Place in 2010. It took some time for him to adjust and adapt. Life did not let up for him though. He later met with a serious accident and “suffered five broken ribs, a collapsed lung and burns on his body, after his short get entangled with a machine for food preparation.”

However, Caleb never gave up on life. He met Grace Sim, 46, who was working as a secretary in a church. They then married in 2018 and Grace came with two teenage sons, Jerel and Jerek (now 20 and 16). 

Imagine that, a father who had lived without a father, had to be a father to two young boys. And incidentally, today is Father’s Day and Caleb’s story is not like those familiar stories you often hear on this special day.

In fact, Caleb’s life in The Hiding Place took an unexpected turn when the late Pastor Philip Chan became a devoted father to him - as he was to many, who were drug addicts, gamblers, drinkers and wayward youth.

As Pastor Chan assured him that he would personally take care of him, in that short time, their relationship blossomed. Caleb later called him “Pa”. 

Caleb recalled that Pastor Chan gave him “unconditional love”. He also said that as a lost and struggling soul, just out of prison, Pastor Chan’s firm guidance was what he needed and had craved after. 

In 2018, before Caleb married Grace, Pastor Chan gave him this advice: “You are not marrying just Grace. She also has two sons. You have to be an example as a father.” Pastor Chan also said that he must spend time to talk and reason with Jerel and Jerek. He said: “Even if they’re your children, they have a right to talk.”

Lesson...?

Alas, in living, Pastor Chan became a father to the fatherless. He stepped up when their birth fathers walked out. And he gave them love when they neither knew love, nor the touch and hugs of a father. 

Not by genes, not by blood ties, but by love unconditional, love most transcending, beyond biology, that Pastor Chan stepped into the gap, and dedicated his life for them. 

Truly, there is no greater love than a man willing to lay his life down for another; that is, for a stranger to become a father, a father to a stranger. And that selfless love was more than enough for Caleb to love his sons in return. 

When Caleb asked his stepson, Jerel, for his blessing to marry his mother, Jerel said: “What took you so long?” And his older brother Jerek said: “I’m happy because I know you will take care of my mum.”

Caleb’s own path to fatherhood was a transforming one. He recalled: “In one tender episode, Jerek reached out to hold his hands on the way to the cinema. Shocked, (Caleb) instinctively felt like pushing it away. But in the next moment, his heart melted and he told himself: “It’s a blessing. This action was confirmation that he accepted me as a father.”

“Then in the cinema, the boy felt cold and snuggled against him, putting his head on his shoulder. “That’s a love I couldn’t have expected,” (Caleb) said.””

At times, Jerek would text him with this simple heartwarming message: “good night, love you.”

As a father myself, with three young kids, I have come to realise that you may have a hand in bringing a child into this world, but it is the journey you take with him that makes you their “Pa”. 

Every son born into this world is a father at heart. However he cannot do it alone because he needs a father before him to love him as his own, and as he is. The heart of father is like a candle, a flickering wick no less, and only the same candle can light it up so that the light of fatherhood can be passed down the line to their own children and to their children’s children. 

And the legacy of fatherhood goes beyond biological ties. It is founded on unconditional love, a love Pastor Chan exemplified so perfectly in his unfailing embrace of the broken, the vulnerable, and the disowned. 

Caleb himself experienced that love, from a man he affectionately called “Pa”. And that short journey with his pa had made all the difference for him and his sons, Jerel and Jerek. 

Let me end with what Caleb said. “I lost everything in the past. God has blessed me with a family.” And it is a family embraced and empowered by the sacred ministry of fatherhood, that is, of being a father to the fatherless, a lover to the unloved, and a candle of light against the darkness of abandonment. 

That, to me, is the timeless message on this Father’s Day. A message not only of hope, but one of enduring love.

PSLE Saga IV - Raphael Lee

Raphael got featured this morning for the second time. Journalist Cheryl Tan interviewed his parents about this “small, brave soul who inspired many.”

Most of you know about his inspiring story, but the interview also tells us about his final day before he passed on. 

The day was Nov 12 this year. And Raphael somehow knew that death was imminent. That brave 12-year-old asked his mother, “What would happen if her only child died before her. If he did, he hoped she would donate his body to scientific research.”

Raphael was afraid, his mother said. In fact, she said: “I don’t think I’ve seen him so afraid before.”

“Just as he was being sedated to begin the operation, he told me, “Mummy, I don’t want to lie down. I want to sit down. I want you to hug me.””

Cheryl wrote: “On the operating table, Raphael suffered from excessive blood loss which resulted in brain damage. He died the following day.”

His mum said: “So that was how he went into a deep sleep, and that was the last time we saw him alert and awake.”

One thing about Raphael is that there is just so much grit in him to want to live his life at such a young age to the fullest. Putting aside his PSLE results, which he did well considering his condition, Raphael was also an “avid online gamer” and he “joined various co-curricular activities in school such as chess club, speech and drama club, and robotics club.”

He did all that even when, at a very young age, he had inherited a rare condition called “Li-Fraumeni Syndrome”, which is “a genetic disorder which predisposed him to a wide range of rare cancers.”

In 2016, to halt the spread of bone cancer in his left forearm, he had his left arm amputated. Yet, nothing could have robbed him of his zest and cheer for life. Nothing dampened his spirit. 

“He would go around to encourage the other cancer patients in his ward, which also earned him the Inspirational Patient and Caregiver Award from KKH of 2020.”

I have written about Raphael a few days ago, and the amazing love he has received from his parents, William and Winnie. I have nothing to add to what Cheryl has written today, and you should go and read it.

My parting shot however is about a gift Raphael gave to his mom last December when he went for an operation to remove his right collarbone.

The gift was something deeply precious to Winnie. It was a simple message in a bottle. The message reads: “I love you Mama,” “with strokes of green, her favourite colour, on the back””. 

Winnie said: “He was a boy of few words but it was always his wish to inspire others with his story.” 

In sum, that is what life is all about - “I love you Mama.” It is a love that always come through. And it leaves nothing the same as it was before, when love completes its work in the lives who truly embrace it. 

Sadly, a young brave life like Raphael’s has come and gone, but his story lives on. He had always wanted to inspire others, even in the hospital ward where he won the award for being an inspirational patient and caregiver. 

However oxymoronic being a patient and caregiver is, Raphael’s short life has shown that you can be a hospital patient, treasuring and fighting for every breathe within you for as long as it takes, yet still lead an inspiring life as someone who never gives up, someone who is always spreading cheer to others.

Indeed, Aldous Huxley once said that “experience is not what happens to a man. It is what a man does with what happens to him.” And Raphael (being just a boy) has gained so much experience when he saw beyond his afflictions, that is, the cancers that had taken part of his body, yet, by conscious daily choices, he never allowed it to take his soul and spirit that were so much bigger than the cancer itself (and mind you, there are so many cancer patients out there who, like Raphael, had fought the good fight). 

Yet, the reality is, within that embattled frame, Raphael fought to the last breath even in the midst of indescribable fear and uncertainty. Winnie saw his fear when he told her: “Mummy, I don’t want to lie down. I want to sit down. I want you to hug me.”

Alas, every child deserves a hug. Every man or woman needs to be hugged too, more often than we think we want or need it. Love may overcome many things in life, but the greatest comfort and hope it brings is not by remote, but by touch, by embrace, and by tears shed and shared. 

In our lifetime, we have said many goodbyes to lives lost to cancer. But, many of these lives have left a story that has inspired the living deeply. 

They have written their stories, amidst the pain and tears, the sorrow and fears. Their words were mostly silence, expressionless, yet their lives continued the legacy, with life-affirming words planted in our hearts whenever we read about their stories. 

Winnie said: “During his wake, there were many attendees who came, some of whom we did not even know. But all of them said he was very brave and strong.”

The world is made better by such stories of bravery and courage. It is Raphael’s message in the bottle to all of us - a message of undying love, a message by one who has fought the good fight, and completed the race of life, no matter how young one was.