CHAPTER 112

2025-12-12

On the last Wednesday of May 1977, after finishing the final exam of the Hong Kong Certificate of Education, I went alone to the New York Theatre to watch the classic film Ben-Hur as a small celebration. That Saturday, I stepped into a Christian church for the first time and met my late wife. She was sixteen; I was seventeen.

I couldn’t guarantee I would get into the University of Hong Kong, and I wanted to avoid an extra year of matriculation, so I applied to the four-year program at the Chinese University of Hong Kong. Victoria needed to focus on her own exams, and we encouraged each other. A year later, we openly held hands, confirming our relationship as boyfriend and girlfriend. In those days, holding hands meant we intended to spend our lives together.

Our bond began as friendship — confiding in each other, understanding one another, and fitting together naturally — and from that we chose to walk the same path for life. Although unexpected turns and challenges came one after another, and though life was full of twists and turbulence, we faced them side by side. We did our best, knowing the journey would not always be smooth nor the ending always as hoped.

Six years after we met, we married. We had one son in Hong Kong and one in Canada. Three days before our 41st wedding anniversary, she passed away from a rare illness, slipping away in less than twelve hours. Her sudden departure was like watching one pillar collapse — and how could the other stand alone? That is why I say: the sky fell on me.

She was the anchor of my sense of safety. I often get lost in dreams, and there are only two ways I find my way out:

(1) encountering her again, or

(2) seeing my Toyota.

She managed the affairs of our home; I focused on work, caring for Lun, driving, joking, “getting sick,” recovering, and going back to work. In hindsight, her sense of security was also built on my state of being. It was as if each of us adjusted our inner clock according to the other’s.

The house suddenly became quiet. My younger son and I kept her ashes at home to accompany us.

My heart feels hollow, yet her face and voice never leave me. Until today, not a single day passes without her in my thoughts.

Places I go alone now tend to be places she wasn’t interested in. The ones she liked, we always went together — and frequently.

She knew what TV shows I enjoyed and would replay them for me. Her favourite shows she rewatched even more, much like Lun does. She knew I loved reading; every season we visited the bookstore together to “pick up” discounted books. When it came to biographies of great figures, we bought them even at full price.

My friends became her friends as well.

Whether she was by my side or not, everything reminded me of her. Our lives were intertwined too deeply, for too long — like two candle wicks braided within a single candle. To say we were inseparable is no exaggeration. Aside from hospital stays or brief trips back to Hong Kong to visit critically ill relatives, we never spent a night apart after marriage.

Each of us held 49% of the “shares” of our life together. During shareholders’ meetings, I often abstained — men shouldn’t argue with women; husbands shouldn’t compete with wives. Now that she is gone, I manage life myself. The company is not going public anytime soon — it remains private.

Life’s pleasures? I must now design, create, and experience them myself — finding patterns and letting them become habit. I continue following the principles of my postoperative recovery: live normally, and let life be normal. When daily rhythms are steady, the activities of life are, naturally, healthy and sound.

Reflection, longing, discernment, evaluation, rebuilding — they come in waves. After a year of living as usual, the storms gradually settled. What remains are sunrises and sunsets, tides ebbing and flowing. In the calm, I taste peace; and only within that peace can I rediscover freedom.