My grandma, once a Teochew opera performer, has dementia. It started when my grandfather passed away and she started talking aloud to him at the wake. I don't even remember them talking much to each other when he was alive! A while later, she became unusually affectionate for a Chinese old lady. She hugged and kissed everyone, even if she could not remember your name. Several years have passed and she spends her day mostly at her favourite armchair, asleep, staring into space or fiddling with a cloth baby doll my uncle gave her. A baby. I don't see my grandma often. And don't think often of her - or her dementia. It is not her who has forgotten - I too have forgotten. Before we forget: G randmother's Garden and other stories (ed. Jeremy Boo. Hachisu: Singapore, 2012) and 忘記書 (read: Wang Ji Shu/Book of Forgetting. ed.劉 鋆. 依揚想亮人文事業(有) : Taiwan, 2012) are more than reminders not to forget those among us with dementia. Before we forget is part of an ...
