28th May was my bother,
Fauzi's birthday. Fauzi (or
ogy, as he is dearly called at home) and I have always celebrated our birthdays together.
I still remember when I was 8 or 9 years old, our dad made us a 4 fold birthday invite with his then very hi tech computer. U know the kind of card where you just select from the template and write whatever you want, then you print it out and the card is created in such a way that u had to fold it into four to create a card. Damn.. I don't know how to explain it.. but I know you got me.
Anyhow, he gave us a bunch of those cards and asked us to distribute it among our friends. Just so happen, our birthday was during a long weekend. (it was a wesak day weekend if I'm not mistaken). So I did just that.. I gave all my invites to all my friends. I was running out of invites by lunch break!
So the day of the party came, all my friends showed up.. my mom had set this one table for the presents. It was over flowing! As we were celebrating, I noticed Ogy was sitting alone, eating his cake.. I looked around, I saw about 2 of his friends at the party. I wondered why rest of his friends didn't show..
So i walked over and asked him, did u invite your classmates? he said, yeah.. i invited 3 (or maybe 4?) but only 2 could make it. I said why? He said, why would they want to come to my birthday party.. So where's the rest of the invites that abah gave you?, I asked. He said, its in my school bag.., he said...I felt so sorry for him that day, that when it was time for us to open our pressies, i gave some of my pressies to him so that he had something to do while i opened mine.
Now he's always been a quite kid. He was so close to his late brother. He looked up to him in everything.. When it comes to buying clothes, Ogy had to ask for his Abg Ngah's approval. Same goes to toys, and in fact, everything..
When his big brother passed away, Ogy seemed lost.. he didn't even know how to pick his clothes at the shop.. When our parents brought us to shop one ramadhan day, my dad said pick anything u want from the shop.. I was running around trying everything until I say Ogy just standing there in the middle of the shop, just staring at a bunch of shirts.. I knew he missed his brother.. I choked. I was trying my best to hold back my tears as i help him pick some shirts. I had to convince him of what's in and what looked good on him.. (I wasn't even sure about boys fashion but I felt that i had to lead him somehow..)
But that was then.. Ogy has grown now. He is now a handsome young man with a gorgeous girlfriend. An engineer in a huge company, an owner of an imported car, a good son to my parents and a great brother to me.
He has always been there for me now. To lend me an ear when I need to let off some steam, to lend me money when i needed to start over after Dubai, to give me some advice on men when I needed em, to support me when I thought that I hit rock bottom, to be a big brother when i needed some reality check.
I love you OGY. I am so blessed to have you as my brother.
So Ogy got me a gorgeous picture frame and a cute card for my birthday, and I made him a scrapbook of his life journey till now. (thanks to Faetz for choosing the pics). I love my pressie and I think he loved his too.. He couldn't wipe his smile off when he was looking at the pics. (my mom whispered to my ears the night I gave ogy the gift, she said, u did good. I think ogy loves it. and i know he's thanking you in his own quiet way.. the scrapbook looks gorgeous.. would you make me one too? haha of course I would mak...) Its my pleasure ogy..
The scrapbook that I made for ogy, its now hanging in his room.
Ogy,
We are all proud of you. Whatever you do, where ever you are, please remember that
WE LOVE YOU.
