Tuesday, August 21, 2007

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Dad called about 10minutes before ‘waktu berbuka’ just now. He was asking for Hannah before my battery went dead. After picking Hannah from the babysitter’s place, I called him back and passed the phone to Hannah. It was heartwarming listening to them talk about fishing, school and how she told her ‘Atuk Ba’ that she was fasting today. She told her grandpa that she didn’t eat anything today. Her face was beaming with pride when she told her grandpa that. Then she added she only drank a few cups of water today, no food just water. That constitutes her definition of fasting. I heard my dad laughed and made his promise to take her fishing. A promise normally he will keep nowadays. After that Hannah passed the phone to me. I asked dad, why the sudden call especially at this odd hour. He said he was worried about Hannah after the body of a girl was found in a gym bag dumped near a shop lot recently. He was ranting about how the psychopath needs to be locked up for hurting children. He ended his sermon with a few advice to me to always look out for Hannah and make sure that she’s near and that I’m always holding her hand whenever we go out. Then he reminded me about the incident at IKEA.

I have lost Hannah once. Irene and Alvin wanted to take her to the playground nearby , while H and I waited in the café. After about 10 minutes, I saw Irene came back with a worried face and delivered us the bad news. H turned to me with a worried face. I almost ran but I didn’t know where I was going, I needed to just go somewhere with the hope to find my baby. She was 3years old then. Everybody panicked and we were scramming in all sorts of directions, trying to find Hannah, leaving all the stuff we have bought in IKEA in the trolley unattended. I finally stopped and I looked around. I turned and I saw Alvin pointing at one direction. I saw Hannah being led by a uniform clad employee and they were going down the stairs. I saw Alvin ran to the stajrs and scooped her up, thanked the employee and brought Hannah to us. Alvin and Irene said sorry profusely to H and I. We knew it was not intentional but I thank God that we found Hannah. So after talking to Dad, I remembered that dreadful experience.
The second thing on my mind was that they found Zurin, the missing girl. I told H to get today’s newspapers and H said that he brought back a copy of NST for me. After breaking our fast at one of the mamak stalls near our house, we went home. The first thing I did was read the newspapers. I was appalled and I cried relating the story to H. The girl they found in the bag was sexually molested and tortured. The papers printed the girl’s photo on the front page. It was an angelic face of a child who died on the hands of a maniac!
In Australia, a girl was found without her parents wandering at the airport. They couldn’t identify her because she didn’t carry any identification with her. She’s only 3 or 4 years old. She’s alive and well except that her parents were no where to be found. The father was with her before supposedly leaving on a plane to the states. Now police from 3 countries are joining forces to find the parents- New Zealand(as they are Chinese with New Zealand citizenship, the girl was found in Australia and the father was leaving to the US). The wonderful thing was that, when they couldn’t identify the girl, they named her ‘pumpkin’ as she was donning from top to toe in Pumpkin Patch’s brand. It is equivalent to Osh Kosh but Australian based brand specializing in kids clothing. I wish we could give the girl we found in the bag a name, instead of calling her “a girl in a gym bag”. The heartbreaking thing was that she was found without any clothing on except bruises that tells a revolting story of torture and senseless idiotic act of cruelty. I want to call her angel because of her angelic face. I pray to God to always let Hannah be with me. I don’t think I can even think of the idea of her missing or be in that predicament. My prayers go out to angel and may she be in heaven where she belongs. My prayers also go to the people that love her. Good night and Happy Fasting.

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