CHAPTER 4

Chapter 4
Heart surgery

"Autumn ends on December's warmth.
Leaves falling on the ground.
My heart has been cut open and transformed.
As I get a second chance to live on."


Recently I started to get a lot of Facebook suggest to connect back to Couples for Christ Jakarta members and finally connect to Jojo Apolo, and by reading his recent post I found out that he was in japan. So I messaged him and see if we could catch up. He told me he was giving a seminar here at nearby Matsudo Catholic Church and told me it would be good if I could attend as well. I would love to if I don't have prior appointments that day. So we agreed to meet the next day near his hotel in Asakusa. I missed my stop that morning and finally was seeing Jojo slurping his coffee on a cozy seat right in front of the cashier of Starbucks Asakusa. "Long time Jojo", I proceeded and we shook hands like old friends.
After I put down my bags I got a cup of coffee for myself and the next conversation was really precious as Jojo kept churning out his advise for me from Health, financial freedom, to writing books in 3 months. He also passed 3 books he wrote for me as a gift.

I told him if he has time to please allow me to buy him lunch. We walked out passing Kaminari mon and went into smaller streets in Asakusa and of all restaurants, he chosed a Ramen Shop. We found a seat on the second floor and started ordering. In the next minute I shared to bro Jojo what's bothering my mind recently. I was found with Artery vascular disorder last year during a mandatory health check in our office. When the female doctor mentioned my heartbeat was strange and needed further checkups I was going to  joke maybe she was cute, but I retracted. Just then I really scheduled appointments with a local doctor in my neighborhood to which I was given an introduction letter to further check at Ichikawa Public Hospital. Ohki doctors took blood test, electrocardiogram, ultrasound, rontgen, CT scan and what else. We came back a few days later to hear the check results and it was positive Aortic valve disorders. While I would not need to rush for surgery, a surgery is inevitable in my lifetime. That was what Dr Ohki said. I was told to schedule checkup again in a year time.

The waiter put our ramen on the table and said, "douzo omeshi agare kudasai." I stopped my story halfway as we held our chopsticks and dag in. Jojo asked me if I have any idea what is NLP. I had not even Googled this, so I was guessing it's a way to program our brain to do something. He said he would just show me. So he asked where I felt pain and I told him it's somewhere in my chest. He told me to put my hand around the pain area and scratch it gently imagining the color, the substance of the pain. I said it was like transparent mucus. Then imagine pulling that transparent mucus in to my palm. The next was to play in palm and to imagine it's getting lighter and lighter and whopped, put that substance back to the pain area. In the process imagine what oldest memory related to this substance. What came to my mind was my childhood days when I was 3 or 4, I always got off my "thui lam" in the morning and my third aunt would serve "Choipan" for breakfast. Jojo sensed I missed my third aunt and suggested I gave her a call after I got home.

My load on the chest did feel better and I felt no pain afterwards. I asked Jojo if it would come back and he assured me that it was completely gone. I paid the bill downstairs and we made our way out of the restaurant. We bid each other farewell after we walked to one of the bigger crossroad.

I scheduled a call wth my third aunt and we had a lovely conversation. She reminded me that I really loved coffee even as minor and my second aunt would hide it away, but she would brew then for me. She laughed. She said actually my second aunt is the one who took more time taking care of me when my parents were at work. I have little memory of this, but I do love my second aunt and had lived for a few years with her in her apartment in Taipei. But it's all too late now, my second aunt had passed away some 3 years back and now my third aunt who felt uneasy and tough with her passing. My second aunt loves her so much, she visited her every now and then, bring delicious cooking for her mostly.
It's all past now. She also died of heart failure. The next time I visit Taipei, I will go and visit her grave.


To be continued.