"You're wishin' too much, baby. You gotta stop wearing your wishbone where your backbone oughta be.”
-

okay. much better now! :)

now let's get back to my meaningful morning. today i accompanied a manda's cousins to carol at the people's dialysis center. hmm. in the first session, i felt quite confused as i was singing the carol. because we were there to share joy, but i felt sad looking at the sad faces of the patients. who knows what they were thinking, maybe about the meaning of christmas? about whether it would be their last one? as we were singing, i caught a glimpse of the old man in front of me wiping off a tear. and that really challenged me in keeping my spirits up.

but i guess all in all, the patients do appreciate some cheer in their lives. these patients are those who have been rejected by the hospitals, as the hospitals only take in patients who have failure in one kidney. the moment both kidneys fail, they are rejected from treatment in the hospitals- almost like a death sentence, i feel. so they are sent to this dialysis center which is mostly for poorer people, costing 10 times less than treatment in hospitals. in the dialysis center, many of the patients were missing limbs. this is because to run the dialysis, a big needle needs to be injected into a major vein in the arm. after some time, this vein will collapse. when this vein collapses, that arm has to be amputated i guess, and the needle is injected into the other arm. when the vein in other arm collapses, the needle are injected into the thighs. finally, when there are no other veins left, the needle is injected into the patients' neck. if that last vein collapses before the patient gets treated, then, no more treatment can be done.

i always thought that old people could be moody and cranky and times, and would like, ignore you whenever they want. but, the people i met today were really nice, they would open up to you as long as you made the initiative, and they were clapping and singing along. it was really heartening to see the patients reading the songsheets diligently and singing along, especially to that song in hokkien. a particular patient, after finishing his treatment, even joined us in our second session to sing for the other patients. lastly, i met this lovely old lady who was all smiles and looked truly sweet because she was looked so happy and at peace the whole time even though i'm sure the dialysis hurt like crazy. hmm. honestly i came to carol today with no idea how carolling would help them, especially when we didn't sing in perfect pitch or anything. but judging from the responses i saw today, i'm sure that at least some people were touched in ways i would never understand.