Alison’s Mom past away in Los Angles, where Helen had lived last five years with Alison and Joel. They devoted their time to her, gave the best care to her. Helen was 98 years old when she past away, she had lived on big island for many many years; Hawaii was her home, her sweet home. Alison and Joel brought back her ashes to scatter into Kailua Kona bay, they invited us.

I only met Helen two times, first time was before we had Sonny; second time was five years ago, Alison came to get her. Sonny was three years old, cute little boy with long hair; Helen mistook him for a girl. From the way she looked at Sonny, there was real fondness, 93 years old sweet lady’s love for 3 years old child. I remember that day, remember Helen very well.

This ceremony happened on May 19, Thursday, at 3:30pm. I’ve never been to this kind of ceremony, and we would like Sonny to see and know, it could be a beautiful ceremony. On the way to there, we tried to explain to him, that every one come to this world, live for a while, then die. If people didn’t die, the world would’t be like this one we are living now; because populated human being would taking nature resource endlessly from earth, it would destroy the earth. So when you alive, enjoy your life and be happy; when you die, your body just disappear into the nature. Life is good, natural death is not bad.

We had a very good wealth that afternoon. When we got to the pier, saw a small group holding hands in a circle; a man was giving a speech, ended with a Hawaii song. Then we got on a clear bottom boat, every one had a bag of flowers, we had some too. Alison even prepared some pu’pu and drinks on the boat. There were a couple of albums of Helen with friends and families, we looked at the photo, and shared some story about her.

Slowly the boat left the pier behind, about 15 minutes later, it stopped. Joel read a page from the Bible, then we sang ” Somewhere over the rainbow” together, say good bye to Helen. Joel scattered her ashes , and we threw flowers into the ocean. And then, we saw some dolphins show up in distant, first there were only two and three; slowly swam to our boat, circling our boat. Later there were 20, 30 of them, hang around the place where Helen’s ashes were, some jumped out from water, spinning around, put up a show. Those dolphins’ appearing made every one happy, it seems that Helen met her new friends; they accepted and greeted her with warm love. We know she is in a good place now.

The whole thing went so well, so beautiful, what an amazing experience !

On the way back, the boat stopped over some coral reef, the lady works on the boat gave us a little lesson about it, especially to Sonny, he was curious. Now he said, he want his next birthday party on this kind of boat; so they can have fun and learn things.

A few days later, one night  in the bed, I had this conversation with Sonny.
” Mom, how do you feel when you die?” It’s question every body wonders about it, and don’t know the answer.
“Don’t know.”
“When you die, everything turn to black, you can’t see any more?”
“I think, when you die, your body can’t feel, you can’t see anymore.”
Then he talked about having tank and airplane, to protect us and his future family from war or Zombie. I tried to convince him, don’t waste his time to worry about it.
“Don’t worry about these things, you are only 8 years old, there will be many many happy things in front of you. You will graduate from Honaunau school, then middle school, high school. You might even go to college, get a job, go to different places, meet lots of people, your future girl friend and get marry. I’m going to be a grand mom when you have your child.” I just babbling all of these things, tried to take his mind off from war, zombie, end of the world. It worked then.

I had two times of experience nearby a dying person, I won’t forget them ever.

Hattie is my good friend, I visited her home on November in 2000, it was my first time and only time see snow. I spent a month there, couldn’t stand the cold winter. When I left, her mom was very sick with cancer, her families knew she was dying, and her mom knew it too.

Aunt was a sincere Buddhist, lived through a lot of harsh times, a very kind woman. She was a vegetarian, it’s not convenient to get nutrition food for her in the village, far away from the market. Home made noodle and steam bun were the main food, mashed up fresh chili sauce was a dish for every meal ( chili was a cash crop for them ).

Their bed is called “Kang”, was build into the house with brick and mud, they make a fire under the bed to keep it warm in winter, outside of the house, there is place to feed the fire. People can’t do very much there in winter.

Before I left, I bought some food for her mom from Xi’an where I was to stay. I went to say “good by” to them, aunt was very weak, lied in the bed. When she saw me, she smiled with happy, good spirit to me. Tears gathered in my eyes, I couldn’t say a word. She held my hand, with the happy smile on her face, said:” Don’t be sad, this is not the end, I’m going to a place of peace and happiness. Don’t afraid death, it’s not a bad thing. When it comes, smile to it.” Those words from her, a dying person, taught me using a new way to look at death. Her body suffered, but her mind was completely in a happy peace land.

Aunt died few months later, I know that she is in a place she wished to be. She is not exist on this world any more, but a piece of memory of her lives, in my mind.