Why was I MIA?

Hi, there.

It's been a while since I wrote something here. And to be honest, I wanted to post so many things that'd been bugging me out ever since Ramadan started. I already started a few writings but then finals came and last but not least, Eid Mubarak Al-Fitr. So, instead of posting them up here, they ended up in my draft folder. 

On July 8th 2016, my brother got a call from my aunt in Majalengka. Tante yang gue panggil Mamah ini minta bantuan buat jagain anaknya yang udah dirawat di salah satu rumah sakit swasta di Cirebon semenjak habis sholat Eid. Karena Mas Dian harus revisi skripsi, secara otomatis dia gak bisa ikut. Singkat cerita, keesokan harinya gue berangkat ke Cirebon berdua sama Ibuk. Meskipun gitu, Mas Dian janji buat nyusul ke Cirebon segera setelah urusan skripsinya selesai.

Sesampainya di rumah sakit, Suci (yang sering gue panggil Uci atau Uschi), terkapar lemah di atas kasur. To those who don't know, she was a great athlete. Sebagai seorang atlet tenis meja yang sering ikut kejuaraan disana-sini, Uci emang termasuk remaja yang aktif. Dia suka banget sama sekolah dan sepulang sekolah dia harus pergi les. Hari-hari libur lesnya sering diisi sama latihan tenis meja atau buat sebuah percobaan di rumah. Uci mungkin orang teraktif yang pernah gue temuin selama ini. However, waktu gue pertama kali liat dia tanggal 9 Juli, dia kelihatan pucat. It made me so upset to see someone as sporty as her couldn't do things she loved most.

Uci suka banget makan tut-tut/keong

Gue sendiri terakhir ketemu Uci bulan Februari lalu pas gue main ke Majalengka sama Mas Dian. Since they live too far from Semarang, it has become our routine to go there every February to see how my aunt's family doing. Waktu itu, Uci masih sehat dan masih nyiapin diri buat POPDA bulan Mei. Jadwalnya selalu full sampe-sampe gue aja pusing liatnya. Meskipun gitu, there was this thing where she bought me lots of her favourite snacks when she came home from school. Abis itu, malemnya kita sering nonton beberapa episode Running Man (variety show in Korea) di laptopnya sampe akhirnya Uci harus ngerjain PR.

Back to the main story.

Selama gue di rumah sakit, ada 2 om gue yang jauh-jauh dateng dari Semarang buat jengukin Uci. She looked genuinely happy to see them. Tahun lalu, Mamah sekeluarga gak bisa mudik karena kondisi kesehatan Mamah yang masih lemah setelah keluar dari rumah sakit. Dan tahun ini pun keluarga Mamah gagal mudik lagi karena Uci jatuh sakit. Jadi, gue bisa ngerti kenapa Uci seneng banget waktu mereka dateng. Magically, kondisi kesehatannya mulai membaik setelah keluarga Semarang dateng. I was surprised to see how much she changed just in the matter of days. She began to smile and alhamdulillah, she also began to laugh a little. Kita semua udah optimis kalo Uci bisa pulang beberapa hari lagi.

On July 16th, the results of her lab tests were starting to look good. Suster-suster bilang kalo Uci boleh pulang sore itu juga. We were so happy to hear that! Makanya gue sama Ibuk langsung mulai packing pakaian dan barang-barang punya Mamah yang ada di kamar itu. Around 5 pm, salah satu suster laki-laki dateng ke kamar dan ngasih tau kalo Uci belum boleh pulang karena suhu tubuhnya yang masih belum stabil.

Uci sempet nangis sebentar karena dia udah jenuh ada di rumah sakit. Selain itu, Uci juga bilang kalo Uci kangen masakan Mamah. Honestly, my heart broke when I heard her sniffle. Tapi karena tujuan utama gue disitu adalah ngasih semangat, gue sebisa mungkin ngehibur dia biar tetep ada kemauan untuk sembuh. Kebetulan kakaknya, Icha, juga lagi pulang dari perantauan. Setelah bercanda dikit-dikit akhirnya Uci mau istirahat.

Besok sorenya, Icha harus pulang ke perantauan dianter sama om gue sampe stasiun. Setelah nganter Icha, om langsung balik ke rumah sakit lagi buat sholat Maghrib dan makan malem sebelum pulang ke Bandung.

This is where things got a little strange..

Selama seminggu lebih gue nungguin Uci, semua orang selalu dibilang bau. Selain itu, Uci juga gampang mual kalo udah nyangkut bau makanan. Maka dari itu, gue dan penunggu yang lain hampir gak pernah makan di dalem ruangan. Anehnya, di Minggu malem itu dia minta gue, Ibuk, om, sama Mamah buat makan bareng di dalem ruangan. Awalnya gue nolak karena gue sebenernya mau terus ngipasin dia (suhu tubuhnya masih 38,3 C). Tapi entah kenapa Uci keukeuh nyuruh gue makan malem bareng yang lain. 

"Sini kipasnya. Mbak Dina makan aja. Uci pengen liat semua makan bareng"

"Hm enak," kata Uci waktu liat kita makan bareng

Gue bahkan sempat fotoin menu makan malem kita dan ngirimin foto itu ke Icha yang lagi ada di kereta. Setelah selesai makan, gue lanjut shift jaga malam (mulai dari jam 9an sampe ngantuk; biasanya jam 12-1 pagi) sementara om pulang ke Bandung. Mamah dan Ibuk istirahat sampe nanti gue mau tidur.

Selama gue jaga, Uci gak rewel. Paling minta minum dan dikipasin aja. Sampe gue minta ganti jaga pun, Uci masih tidur pules. Tapi siapa sangka 3 jam setelah gue tidur, semuanya berubah 180 derajat? Since she lost lots of blood, she looked incredibly pale and weak. Uci juga beberapa kali bilang mau kehilangan fokus. Inilah yang akhirnya ngebuat dokter mindahin Uci ke ruang ICU beberapa jam kemudian.

Gue tinggal di kamar buat beres-beres dan sholat Dhuhur. I kept praying to Allah just so she can survive. Gue terus-terusan mikir kalo Uci itu seorang pejuang dan gak akan nyerah. Setelah selesai sholat dan baca Surat Yasin, ternyata ada misscall dari Ibuk yang lagi nemenin Mamah di ICU. Perasaan gue udah gak karuan ketika gue mutusin buat nelpon balik nomer Ibuk. And then I heard the most painful sentence I've ever heard. 

"Adek gak ada"

I was still in denial. "Masa? Serius?"

Dan ketika Ibuk jawab 'iya', I broke down crying. Gue sendirian di kamar dan nangis sejadi-jadinya. Sampe gue langsung nelpon sahabat gue yang ada di Salatiga buat nenangin diri. Sayangnya, that phone call was useless. I cried so hard that day until I couldn't feel a thing anymore. It was unfair. She was the most selfless person I've ever met in my entire life and there was no way she deserved any of this. My heart shattered into million pieces. My baby cousin. It hurts so much just to think about it. 

Who would've known this bundle of joy would be gone so quickly?

I couldn't help but kept thinking that it should be me. It should be me who suffered those diseases, not her. Uci bahkan belum berumur 17 tahun dan Allah udah manggil dia dulu. Gue inget betapa excitednya Uci untuk dapet KTP dan SIM besok Desember. And now I only got memories of her being giddy about her 17th birthday.

Insha Allah, gue ikhlas. I mean, at least Uci udah gak kesakitan lagi sekarang. Writing this post was really hard because I kept crying. Ketika gue lagi main sama temen-temen atau lagi kumpul sama keluarga, rasanya gampang banget untuk gak ngerasa 'kosong'. But then these feelings hit me in the most unpredictable times. Waktu di mobil, di kamar mandi, di kamar gue sendiri. Gue lebih sering nangis di saat-saat gue sendiri, jauh dari orang-orang.

The worst thing is that I'm not sure if these feelings will disappear.

Uschi, Mbak Dina kangen denger ketawa Uschi. Kangen nonton Running Man bareng Uschi. Kangen ngipasin Uschi. Mbak kangen liat Uschi yang gak pernah bisa diem.

Yang tenang ya, dek. Temenin Dek Sekar di atas sana. Kita semua selalu berdoa dari sini.

Kisses

Dee

Book Review: Eleanor & Park

Title: Eleanor & Park

Author: Rainbow Rowell

Rainbow Rowell has made me, yet again, emotional with her work. This beautiful love story between an Asian guy named Park and a red-haired girl named Eleanor touches me in unimaginable way possible. Rowell made me cry (again).

I would like to say that the story revolves around Eleanor who's described as a fat girl with a lot of freckles on her face whose family is a bit messed up ever since her mother married another man. The author also describes a very detailed situation at her new place.

Even so, this novel wouldn't had happened if she didn't meet Park whose mother is a Korean. Not like Eleanor, Park grows up in a stable neighborhood. The only bad thing about his family is that his father expects so much from him meanwhile Park isn't exactly willing to do what his father wants. He rather spends his time reading comics than go to the karate (or judo, I can't remember) with his brother.

In the beginning of the story, Eleanor is just a weird new kid in Park's school which happens to be on the same bus as him. Having thick red-hair along with her overweight aren't a great thing to begin with. She gets teased and bullied a lot in school because her appearance doesn't fit into the society's beauty standard.

Being an overweight girl myself make me relate to Eleanor very well. I get teased quite a lot just because my look isn't good enough for others. Just recently, a few neighbors of mine think that it is okay for them to comment on my weight which is actually very annoying. In the book, Eleanor doesn't think too much about her bullies except maybe when they hide her clothes after PE class. This is a good example for girls out there who are constantly being picked on just because they're too fat -or too skinny.

Rainbow Rowell has sent a very powerful message through this book even though it is set in 1986. Not only in Eleanor, we can see that she also sends a message through Park who is different from any other men in his family. He maybe shorter than his little brother but he always stands up for what he believes in. Park even helps Eleanor overcome her fear towards meeting new people.

Overall, this is a book you can't miss. The plot twist is not that predictable and with the way Rowell writes, she makes me feel like I am in the book. I feel like I see both Eleanor and Park with my own eyes because she doesn't use stupid metaphors to describe her characters. I also love the fact that she makes Park being honest about his feelings. From what I've seen around me, not many men say 'I love you' for the first time, so it is good to see a man (even he is a fictional character) says the three sacred words in the relationship before the woman.

Rate: 9/10

Kisses,

Dee