TURBINE | KAPOHAU

For the first two decades of my life, I devoted a lot of energy and time to being angry at my father. He cheated on Mum, had a child with his mistress and broke up our family for a new one. In my young, moralistic mind, Dad was a walking cliché and a ready-made villain, responsible for everything that went wrong in my childhood. I was reluctant for many years to give him credit for his one act of heroism, when he protected me from Mum’s fit of rage that evening before the divorce. I would tell myself the bare minimum he could have done after fucking everything up and putting me in Mum’s crosshairs was to take the hit intended for my head. 

Dad was emotionally reserved and, given the amount of help afforded to our household, he was not deeply involved in parenting, though this is not an unusual dynamic in any traditional Chinese family. In the jumbled memory of my time in Macau, I remember spending time with Dad more frequently at his office, a large floor space where I would go after school to play with his staff. Dad was kind and generous with people who worked for him, and it was clear to me from a young age that everyone on his staff at the house and in the office respected rather than feared him. It was not hard to see why he was a popular and well-liked member of the Macanese high society, constantly surrounded by friends and other businesspeople wherever he went. The occasional outbursts of rage were strictly reserved for behind closed doors at home. 

Growing up, I always felt that the shadow of my grandfather affected Dad more than he would admit. Most of Dad’s other siblings lived in Hong Kong or overseas, and the other sibling that stayed in Macau was seen as the heir apparent to my grandfather’s legacy. Dad did not seem interested in being in the spotlight and always looked uncomfortable when asked to participate in any sort of public event. He preferred to keep a low profile, always choosing more practical luxury cars over extravagance, and would not tolerate any sort of behaviour that made us look like spoilt rich kids. He would not buy us luxury brand clothing, flew economy when we travelled, and taught us from a young age that nothing is a bigger rip-off than hotel mini bars.  

Dad seemed genuinely happy when he immigrated to Australia with us. I remembered how relaxed he always appeared, as though the weight of expectation that he carried in Macau disappeared overnight. He would drive us to Chatswood, a suburb nearby with a large Chinese population, to go to yum-cha, shop at the Asian supermarkets and buy his daily long blacks. The Chinese community in the North Shore was close-knit enough that people knew of our family’s prominence in Macau, so we still enjoyed certain advantages like guaranteed tables at Chinese restaurants that normally did not take reservations. One of Dad’s favourite activities besides cooking was hand-washing cars, enjoying it so much he would offer to wash my aunt’s car alongside ours. He would spend the entire afternoon in his white tank top and black shorts, cigarette in his mouth, carrying the bucket of water around the cars, meticulously scrubbing, rinsing and drying them to ensure they were completely spotless. Dad also loved long road trips, taking us to the Gold Coast, Melbourne and the ski fields in our family van — though after getting two speeding tickets in one day on one of these trips, he split some of the driving with my stepmum. 

There was never any doubt in my mind that the laid-back, suburban life was the life Dad was happiest in. The few years he was forced to stay home and be a family man in Sydney, he played the role of an involved father and cared for his four kids the best he could. I had always tried to imagine what our relationship would be like if Dad had chosen to stay in this life, instead of returning to Macau to continue his stressful but financially rewarding life as a well-connected businessman. After his return to Asia, our relationship was distant once again. He would still return to Sydney for short visits, and my brothers and I would split our time between both parents when we spent our summer holidays in Hong Kong, but the era where Dad’s primary concern was to be a father to his children was over.  

 

By late September of 2006, Dad and I mostly learned to stop arguing over things we knew would go nowhere — like my career choices — and found common ground on things we could agree on to keep the peace. We bonded over our shared love for long blacks and our tobacco addiction, frequently bumming cigarettes off each other. When my brother Connor called to let me know that Dad was at the hospital undergoing some tests to check on his worsening cough, I was immediately filled with a sense of dread. ‘It doesn’t look good, come as soon as you can,’ he whispered. I immediately jumped into a taxi and went to Hong Kong Sanatorium, a private hospital in Happy Valley, where Dad was getting lung X-rays. When I arrived, the whole family was there, and we went into the doctor’s office to look at the scans. There was a huge shadow in his lungs.  

The oncologist told Dad that while he was certain he had lung cancer, more tests would be needed to determine how far it had spread and to come up with a treatment plan. Dad took it all in quietly and asked the oncologist, ‘Does that mean I have to stop smoking?’ The doctor, who had been making a valiant effort to keep this as light as he humanly could, replied matter-of-factly, ‘Well, you already have lung cancer, so you can’t possibly make it worse. If you want to keep smoking, you absolutely can.’ 

Fuck, he’s not going to make it. I thought to myself. 

Dad was deeply superstitious and scared of death, and we knew that if we did not directly ask the oncologist anything specific about Dad’s prognosis while he was present, he did not have to tell Dad the truth. Privately, he told us Dad would likely have six to twelve months to live with treatment. We mustered up as much positivity as we could while he underwent chemotherapy, and people from all walks of Dad’s life would visit, bringing him fruits, flowers and expensive Chinese ‘nurturing’ foods like ginseng, herbal soups and swallow’s nest. The treatment and illness slowly ravished Dad’s body, his hair fell out, and his weight eaten away by the cancerous cells and the medical poison pumped into him to fight the decay. I would hear him vomit through the wall we shared, and my stepmum would run to the kitchen to fetch Dad hot tea in hopes of helping him feel better.  

Dad never did smoke another cigarette again. 

 

Before his diagnosis, I had planned on coming out to Dad despite knowing he was openly and deeply homophobic — an extremely common sentiment in Hong Kong and amongst the Chinese people. While I was not out to relatives on Dad’s side of the family, I was also not hiding my queerness: I had taken over as Director of the Hong Kong Lesbian and Gay Film Festival, giving interviews in that capacity in local newspapers leading up to the festival. It seemed inconceivable to me that he did not know I was gay, but it was something that he was happy to turn a blind eye to as long as I was not explicit about it. After he got sick, I debated whether to go through with it: Was it a final chance for us to be honest with each other, or was I merely pursuing a selfish act, something that would cause more anger and heartache for a dying man for the sole purpose of some level of validation? I ultimately chose not to say anything, allowing him plausible deniability that his rebellious, disappointing daughter was not a dyke on top of it all. 

Dad and I never talked about that night, the divorce, nor anything that happened between us. Everything I know about the events is from Mum’s perspective, and in her version of events there is little doubt that she was the victim of his actions. The reluctance to talk about anything that has happened is a central family motif — there was never an appropriate time to discuss our feelings and thoughts with one another beyond shallow gossip. Knowing Dad was running out of time, I kept imagining different scenarios in my head for us to have our dramatic showdown — I would confront him directly and Dad would make an emotional speech defending himself, or he would be in his hospital bed, calling us to his bedside as he confessed to his regrets. 

But life is not a movie.  

There were a few occasions where I was alone with Dad in the family van and I tried to muster up the courage to have a conversation with him. But we ultimately chose to do what we had always done: fill our remaining time together with silence. 

 

Dad lived beyond the six months initially laid out by the oncologist, though the decay had set in, his frail body straining to keep him on this earth. Connor’s son Elliott was approaching his first birthday in April, and the family planned a huge party, as much for Dad to celebrate with his beloved grandson as it was for Elliott. A dinner party was thrown at the Hong Kong Jockey Club, filled with family and friends, some even traveling from overseas just for the occasion to see Dad before he ran out of time. Throughout the night, Elliott would sit on his lap and Dad’s face would beam with unadulterated joy — I had never seen my dad so happy in my life. 

After the dinner, Dad insisted he was well enough to drive home. He got into the driver’s seat, and within minutes he was unable to see the bend in the road, forcing my stepmum to grab the steering wheel, narrowly avoiding our car directly smashing into the concrete barrier. We pulled over so my stepmum could drive, and all of us sat in complete silence the rest of the trip home. 

I was in the office the next afternoon when I got a call telling me that Dad had deteriorated and had been taken to hospital. By the time I arrived in his room, he was awake and alert — though the oncologist felt it was prudent to keep him under observation for a few days before deciding whether he could go home. However, once Dad was out of earshot, he told us this was likely very close to the end, and it would be sensible to be mentally prepared. With Dad relatively stable once he was admitted to hospital, Connor decided to go to Bangkok early next morning to see a Taoist guru for blessings. The rest of us went to the hospital in the morning, where Dad was weak but in good spirits. Worried I was starting to get sick, I wore a mask and kept a level of distance from Dad’s bed as my stepmum, Aunty Stella and Connor’s wife Linda doted on him.  

When Dad woke up from his nap, he said he was hungry and could use some lunch, sending my stepsister Jenny to the kitchen to prepare a home-cooked meal for him. Dad asked for his bed to be moved to a sitting position so he could eat, and as he sat upright, he let out a small cough, and in barely a whisper, ‘Oh.’ 

Blood poured out of his mouth uncontrollably, as if a pipe had burst. Time seemed to slow to a complete stop, seconds felt like an eternity, freezing all of us around the bed as we could do nothing but stare at Dad covered in his own blood. My stepmum finally moved, rushing to press the call button, and I ran to the small kitchen outside his room where Jenny was and pulled her back inside. Still in shock, I was unable to utter a sound as she tried to ask me what was happening, and when she walked into the hospital room, the colour fled her face as she, too, fell into a stunned silence. 

When the nurse came into the room she immediately called for support, and soon a medical team rushed in to work on Dad, frantically trying to stop the bleeding. Dad was eventually put on a life support machine, but it was abundantly clear that he was gone. When the oncologist arrived, he confirmed it was a matter of calling anyone who would want to come by to say goodbye before turning off the machine keeping him alive. Connor, now in Bangkok, had to rush back to Hong Kong, and as the eldest son, the responsibility to turn off the life support fell to him. With our nerves somewhat settled, we began to make our round of calls to share the grim news while we waited for Connor to return. I called Mum, who had not spoken with Dad for years, and told her to come. She was uncomfortable at the idea, but I insisted, ‘This is your last chance to say goodbye.’ She came soon after I called, later telling me she was glad not to rue missing her chance to say goodbye before he passed.  

People poured into the hospital throughout that afternoon, with many family members and friends coming as soon as we called. Uncle Harry, the family member closest to Dad, wept uncontrollably. It was the only time I had seen him cry. Many stuck around to console us and each other, and in the sterile hospital halls, the hours of waiting felt like an eternity.  

Dad never regained any level of consciousness, the breathing machine doing the work to keep his body alive, and as more and more people came to the hospital, I began to shut down mentally, overwhelmed by the events of the day and the amount of people wanting to offer their sympathies and talk with us. I could not stop staring at Aunty Stella’s shoes, where remnants of blood drops were still visible. As evening approached and the halls emptied — save for our immediate family and some of Dad’s closest friends — Connor finally made it back to Hong Kong and arrived at the hospital. We gathered around Dad one last time, and after Connor said goodbye, we turned off his life support.