Dear Sandra,

I had the awesomest, most satisfying dinner in months. No doubt it was home-cooked, but it was yummylicious to the max.
Slow-cooked lotus root soup, steamed fish, stir-fried leeks and pork-stuffed fish maw.
Quintessential CNY reunion dinner, no?
You know how much I enjoy being in Melbourne and the fab food scene they have there but nothing beats mum's home-cooked food at our round marble dinner table at home.
And I thought about you then and how you would have loved to celebrate just one more CNY with your family. I guess, I would never ever really get over you going away so soon. I still can't really bring myself to write the D word yet. I can't even say the D word. Whenever I talk about you, I just say "you're gone too soon". I think it makes it sound like you're going away for a while but you'll be back, like some kinda holiday, ey? But, I will eventually get it though my thick head, I promise. Hopefully, in June, when I go and see you properly, I will be able to reconcile with that fact.

I mean, I kinda need to get with this whole passing on thing, seeing as I will probably be dealing with it on a daily basis fairly soon. And the whole week after mum called me was hell for me. I don't think I dealed with it quite as well as I thought I could have done. I honestly thought that maybe I wasn't really cut out for this whole doctor thing. But I think you were right there with me the whole time, I just was grieving too much to notice you. And mum said that I took a hard hit just because we were close and this would just be another thing I could learn from. So, you're my teacher now, Sandra. Should I bring you a shiny red apple when I visit you in June? lols.

I know I'll have a great CNY break this year and you'll be in my mind the whole time, having fun with me.