* family ties*
the past few weeks have been another hectic roller coaster of term papers, work, assignments, and simply trying to stay afloat and coherently digest my life on a day-to-day basis.

since coming back from toronto, i went straight into a 10-week practicum placement for 2 days a week. i've been placed at a government subvented social services organization called st. james settlement, working in elderly services. it's been interesting for 2 reasons:
* the entire centre is completely in chinese (all print materials/notices as well)
* i've never really worked with the elderly before

the total non-english environment was a mental strain for the first few weeks, but i think i've adjusted to it. being with people who are on average more than 30 years my senior has been a sweet awakening of how precious life is. my classmates and i have started a 'reminisence group', where we have 12 members and we've been talking about different aspects of their youth. they have been amazingly generous to share with 3 young hooligans their experiences and stories.

interestingly, at this time, i was also faced with a sort of dark shadow of my own past. since my parents seperated when i was very young, and my sister and i stayed with our dad. and since moving to canada 25 years ago, i've probably only seen my mom a handful of times. which means that we never ever knew any of her side of the family. i grew up not ever thinking about this part of my family, and not even really conscious that they existed to tell you the truth.

but out of the blue, my mom's sister - my aunt, and her daughter - my cousin, were in hong kong and we got to spend a few days together. my aunt sophia married a belgian and had been living in belgium since 1972 and my cousins are all rather european. and stranger than suddenly discovering that i had european cousins, was the resemblance that aunt sophia had to my mom. aside from being less dysfunctional, and more westernized, she was a spitting image of my mom. it was wierd. she told us stories of her childhood and about our grandmother, and after just 2 days with her, i feel like i learned more about my mom's side of the the family than i've ever known my whole life. i've suddenly got a new dimension to my "family".

so the past week or so i've just been contemplating the significance of heritage and passing things down to the next generation. when i talk the people in our reminiscence group, they tell me that they never really get a chance to remember or reflect on the experiences of their past. when it comes to family, everyone is usually too busy to sit down and just listen to stories of lived lives. isn't that sad?

i just hope i have something better to pass down than what my mom gave me. i hope i can help our kids stay connected with their family heritage in a healthy way. and i wonder what kind of grandparents our parents would be? it's a bit scary thinking about how our kids would grow up. there are so many unknown & uncontrollable factors. too many what if's....

to be honest, i don't really know what to do with this new-found door to this part of my past. in the meantime, the belgian chocolate and truffles are doing me good to get me through the next few weeks of school and work...