Old is Gold

A few days ago I received a surprise call from my aunt who is now 78 years old. She said,"Peggy, I'm now in Kota Kinabalu. I want to see you."

Thrilled that she had really come to KK all the way from Johor Bahru, I shut down my computer and together with my spouse, we drove to where she was putting up, quite a long distance away.

She had come with more than 250 retired Chinese school teachers. They had chosen KK as the venue for their meeting and hoped to visit Mt. Kinabalu and its surroundings.
Most of them, according to her are in their late seventies and eighties.

She brought her friend along and we took them to see Yayasan Sabah building now known as Menara Tun Mustapha, and then to our house as she wanted to see where I stayed.

Then we took them out for a dinner where we dined on mud crabs cooked in salted egg, the special Sabah vegetable found only here in Sabah, a seafood soup and braised tofu. She said she enjoyed both the crabs and vegetables.

She was very excited as this was her first trip to Sabah, and outside Peninsular Malaysia ever since my uncle, her spouse, passed away a few years ago. They were looking forward to Mt Kinabalu where they would stay one night and would visit the ruins of an old fort, a rose farm, the market stalls and other places of interest.

It was lovely to be able to see her here in Kota Kinabalu as I hardly go to Johore these days. She is as sprightly as ever and her sharp mind belies her age.