Visiting Grandma, Between a Grandmother & a Granddaughter

Savoring the memories, of your childhood, that your maternal grandmother helped you gained…translated…

My granddaughter, Rice Cakes used the videochats, played coy with me, “Go to, Grandma’s House!”, for her, grandma’s house is right there for her, at any time, she can come to me, but in my own childhood, grandma’s home is a distant, and beautiful, place!

My mother married from Taipei to Chiayi, and, in the timeframe of a year, she only got to visit home once, during our, summer, vacations, and there was only the fast trains, without the assigned, seats, as the train got into station, our parents first, “threw” my youngest sister and the luggage from the window, onto the seats inside, then, led the group of us, onto the trains, that way, we would, have the seating available to us.

It takes about seven, eight hours, for the trains to finally, get into, Taipei Main Station, then, we’d, transferred, and by the time we’d arrived at my maternal grandmother’s home, it was, already, dark out.  And, my grandma already, waited too long in her garden, and, formally, the happy summer vacation with grandma had, begun, for us all

memories we made with our, grandmothers…photo from online

Our playground was that Japanese-style building that was the dormitory of the school principals, other than the yard and the entry, there were also, three large rooms with the straw mats, the rooms separated by the sliding doors, the living room with the piano, and the bathroom with the bathtub made of Taiwan cypress.  All of these for me when I was younger, was like, a labyrinth, fit for that game of “hide-and-go-seek”, hiding ourselves in any place, nobody can, find us, that was, a happy heaven for our games that we’d played.

Early in the morn, we’d, sat on the wooden floor of the living room, my grandmother would play the piano, and sing those, songs, we’d, hummed along, she was an elementary school music teacher, also our first music instructor.  Sometimes, she’d taken us out hiking too, and we’d, sung along the way, “go, go, go, go, go, hand in hand, we go………”, the childish voices, resonated through the entire, mountain.  At the time, the pebble road paved on mud wasn’t easy to trek, but grandma’s words of encouragement, it was, enough, to have all of us hike the whole way, then, we got to, enjoy the sweet rewards of ice cream from grandma.

And I’d looked forward the most to the nighttime baths that we got, the tub made of cypress, elevated by the bricks and the iron pieces, with the firewood burning underneath, as the steams rose, and our bodies cleaned, the four of us, would leap into the wooden keg, and started the water wars, the splashes, the laughter, filled up the, entire, space.

There were, many new experiences, that we’d shared with our, maternal grandmother, first time we’d played the piano, hiking, tasting that ice cream, bathing in the cypress bathtub………but, these happy times, flew by fast, when I was in the fourth grade, my maternal grandmother, passed away, and that halted these, happier, times for us, and it’d left us with, enormous, pains and losses.

making their homes warm, and welcoming to us…photo from online

Time flew, almost fifty years had gone by, but the joyous atmosphere my maternal grandmother created for us, will never be, far off form me, enough for all of us, to remember throughout our, whole, lives.

So, this is the legacy of joy, of happiness that your grandmother gave to you and your sisters, and, she did everything she possibly could, to help you guys have a very, enriching childhood, with the assortments of lovely, experiences.