I just heard that Lam had an operation to remove a colon tumor from zzq. Though the results of prognosis have yet to be revealed, the situation was described as "not optimistic". As I was worried about him, memories of Lam popped out from nowhere and, let's just say, overwhelmed me.

"Mr. Lam" was what we first came to know him as ten years ago. My first impression of him was that this round, funky middle-age man (he spiked his hair!), whom we later discovered to have been the coach of Singapore's judo national team, could hardly be a suitable candidate for a middle school maths teacher. But since I knew that he was the man who was going to take care of all the 34 (some kind and forgiving soul corrects me if I got the number wrong) of us young, impressionable, and sometimes arrogant (and yes, all male) adolescents, I felt natural to make an effort to know him better.

That wasn't hard at all. For starters, he lived just downstairs. And he surely made his presence felt. He always walked around to check on each and everyone of us and he frequently invited us to his place (later on, we shamelessly invited ourselves). We quickly became acquainted with his movie collection, shelves of comics, judo moves, laughter, and very very tight hugs. As such, it came as no surprise that "Mr. Lam" was gradually replaced with "Lam" or "Lam Baba" (Hey, we were a group of guys. Please don't expect us to come up with any more endearing titles).

Due to some stupid reason that I cannot recollect now, I began to distance myself from him. The estrangement took on a life of itself and kept deepening, even when the initial causes faded in memory. So now I forgot what went wrong and all I know is that I miss him. I still remember he said to me one day, "I have to save money now." "Why?" I asked. Come on, he was probably not going to have a wife or kids to spend money on and he earned decently. Why did he need to save money for. "I need to have enough Ang Bao (red packet) money for each of your weddings. I would probably be retired then, where can the money come from?" All along, we were family to him. We were sons to him...

Which is why I'm really comforted to hear that at least one of us (kudos to xiaohu, xuwei, kun ge, xiao hei, zzq and many others. I'll see to it that I knew everyone who took care of Lam) is at his bedside everyday. In fact, the word "us" may be too much of an indulgence, too much of a luxury for me to use. I haven't been doing anything for him and I can't do anything for him now. Except, perhaps, praying...

I met Bruce and Fred in Chicago last weekend. I just realized that I couldn't have even know them had Lam Baba not brought us to that tiny island...