liyana,

The distance that took you away from me. Those were the times which my memories are pretty vague. It has been several years since. And I can hardly recall the details.

You went to the Netherlands. You stayed there for a couple of years. It was for one of the non-profit organisations that were based there. You looked forward to it. You wrote about your life there. The little moments that you collected along the way and you described it with a quiet mix of enthusiasm infused with child-like excitement.

I remembered a little detail or two.

Those are the ones you wrote about the building you lived in where you can view the simple life of this little town you stayed in. Rows of houses with monotonous shades of rooftops, the cobblestone streets that connected people’s lives on foot and on bicycles, the early morning smell of fresh bakery. You could see a classroom or part of it from your little window, and you wondered whether the lesson has started. Again you painted this town with life as you described the little heart-felt details around you.

I could imagine as you spoke of the colourful autumn foliage that you cycled through every day to and from the train station where you commute to work. You showed a photo of your bicycle which was orange in colour. In it you look rather flushed from cycling in cold weather.

Cooking was not really an interest to you.

But being away, you were forced to try your hands at cooking our local delicacies. You missed your parents cooking. I remembered when you told me you failed a couple of times cooking nasi lemak. They became lumpy and did not taste as good. You fared better with prawn fried rice where you spent hours getting the recipe from your dad.

You liked the Netherlands so much you made me promise to go there one day with you. All the beautiful things to see, you said. The laid-back scenery to breathe in. You wanted to show me all the places that coloured your brief period of life there. Part of you will always remain there, you said while we were having supper when I came home late from work one night.

Perhaps that’s where we’ll go to retire, I responded. Absent-minded as I was struggling to finish off the tasteless healthy cauliflower junk you cooked earlier. As long as they have great Indonesian cuisine, I secretly wished.

But we never did.

A promise is a promise. I hear you, liyana.

It is going to hurt like hell. But I will, trace these places that you have been to. The imprint of life you left behind. And at each and every step, I shall find you waiting.

chairil