11th October 2012 - The bomb site.

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11th October 2012

I went to the bomb site today

It was surreal.

There were people and news reporters everywhere. It was anything but peaceful and tranquil. The site itself is being used as a carpark, which I knew about, but to see in real life was shocking in itself. 

 My Grandma showed me where it was believed the girls were standing right before the bomb went off, I stood about two meters away, to afraid to move closer.

I remember now back to the day my Dad was in hospital, how I stood metres away from the bedside for a long time before I went closer to him.

 

My Grandma left me alone at the site, which gave me time alone to think about everything. 

Being the day before the anniversary, there were quite a few people there, laying flowers and silently crying. I felt myself, so very out of character, starting to do the same. 

It must have been a full hour that I stood there, just looking into empty space, thinking about what this place did to my family, and everything that came after in the last 10 years. 

 

I met my Nan as the sun was setting, at the memorial site, and I helped her lay some flowers down.

 I went and bought a few bottles of Bintang, and had a drink there for my Dad. 

I figured that’s what he would have done.

 

As I stood in front of the memorial site drinking away, the band at the pub across the road began playing ‘Tears in Heaven’, a song I’ve always associated with Jodi as it was played at her funeral, and I stared up into the sky smiling.

*My Dad had a tattoo on his arm of two stars, one inside the other. He told me that when we was young and his first sister died, his Mum told him that the biggest star in the sky was Michelle looking down on him (Yeah, very Lion King..) so after Jodi died, he got the two stars for his two sisters who heaven had taken from him.

Two years ago I got a tattoo of a small star behind my ear for my Dad, for that very reason.

 

As I stood there at the memorial, drinking a Bintang for my Dad and Jodi, listening to the band across the road play tears in heaven, I put my head back and stared at the sky. There were no stars through the thick polluted sky, except one right above me.

It was a nice moment.

:)

To me, that’s what coming here was about.

Reconnecting with everything I have put behind me and not thought about and I have gone to pay my respects, and I did it the way my Dad would have for his little sister.