I'm My Daddy's Daughter

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Some people are lucky enough to have their dads live long life, and some have to be tough for not having a chance to even know theirs. Well I guess I'm somewhere in the middle here. Almost all my life, my dad had always lived far from us. He studied in the USA when my baby sister was born, and worked in Jakarta or traveled around Indonesia when we lived in Bandung. We got to see him only on weekends, and it really wasn't enough for us to get to know each other.

We finally got the chance to live together with our dad for only two years top, and that was when we stayed in crowded small apartments in both Sudirman and Tanjung Duren areas--a year each. Actually, Daddy didn't get to live for a full year in the second apartment. He died in December 2009 when he was 59 years old, leaving a big hole in our hearts and lives...

But somehow I'm rebuilding my life around his paths. And in each step, I get to know him a little better, putting the pieces of his world that he had been keeping from us. And for now, I'm going to say proudly than ever, that I'm my daddy's daughter. (I've been meaning to write this on his 'supposedly' 67th birthday last June 9--as the 60th birthday present we never got to give--but I was so preoccupied I just had the time now..)

1. He helped me get born

My dad was a doctor. He never take any medical specialist and later he got his MBA degree. But when I was born, he was on his co-as duty positioned in a community health clinic in Wolowaru, a small village three hours away from Ende, NTT. Being the only doctor around, I wasn't even born in a hospital. A Western nun named Sr. Christina took the role of being a midwife and my dad was her assistant. I guess it's true that children feel closer with father who attends their moment of birth. I had my dad helped me get born. Maybe that's how emotionally close I was with him.

2. They say I look so much like him

I never get how people could say that I look like my dad (while my siblings got more of my mom's look), because every time I look at the mirror, I never see him. I got my grandpa's eyes, my grandma's skin, my dad's nose, but not more than that. But it doesn't mean that I don't like it. I enjoy being told that I look like him. I love that. It's just that I can't see it myself and every time anyone says that, I'd feel extremely happy. It's just nice to hear this. And my heart, I know I got it from him.

3. I got my writing skill from him

I never knew this, but few years back I just knew that my dad had a column he used to write on Hidup, a national Catholic magazine. But I knew he used to have translation projects for second income, and now I'm paying my bills from the writing jobs. We always knew that we got the geek part from our dad, because almost all of his family are super smart people (and we got our artistic part from our mom.) So yeah, even though none of us followed his path to become a doctor, at least I got some of his skills.

4. He's always been the rebel

I never realized this before, but recently my sister said that she remembered how I was being a teenager: I was hard to tame and rebellious. I thought I got that from my mom, but I think I got it from both of my parents, only in different forms. Being a doctor, my dad was overly open to any 'alternative' healing methods: from acupuncture, Chinese medicines, Reiki, and Eastern martial arts. He was up to any theory, be it common or not; his curiousity and eagerness for learning were limitless. I guess that's why I like to get to know stuff that are a bit odd, spiritually interesting, and just against the current. I really am that geek.

5. I'm following his path

It didn't take me long to realize, but the novels that I'm writing right now are one of his legacies. We got our Bantenese/Javanese royalty line from him and his guardians are the ones who guide me. I was raised far from any cultural traditions, but now I'm learning more about our ancestors, and have found the missing pieces he had been keeping from us. I wasn't planning to--wasn't even close to thinking about it, really--but I guess I'm guided to this path and I'm so much grateful for every bits of that.