Old and Alone

Today, my 20 year- old-sister went door to door trying to persuade people in Taman Jurong to go to the neighbourhood house screening. She is a doctor in training. ( a very passionate one too)
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After a day's work, she came home very happy . She was so happy that she could speak hokkien to many of the patients she treated. She was very excited to teach me a few words in hokkien. Actually come to think of it , I do not know how to speak hokkien at all. I feel pretty ashamed about it. I am a hokkien by nature but have no idea to speak the language.( Many kids my age can at least speak their dialect)

Then, my sister told us what she experienced today. The first person my sister was trying to persuade was an old man. He was extremely thin. Malnutrition, I think. He did not want to do a checkup. Do you know what his reason was? He said he was 78 years old and going to die soon, if he did a checkup and had a disease , he would need to be hospitalised( a waste of money to him) . Doing a checkup was pointless. He continued and said his children had abandon him and he had to go hungry on many occasions. (No wonder he is malnutrition)

Hearing this, I am really sympathise him. I realise I am very lucky to a to have three meals a day. Many people around the world are dying of hunger, while the lucky ones are wasting food . His children are really too much. He had raised them since birth but they were not grateful at all. They had abandon him without second thoughts ,leaving him old and alone. We , children should be grateful to our parents and when we grow up , it is only right to take care of them.
Apparently, there are a lot of elderly living at Taman Jurong. Mostly living alone.(luckily most of them were easier to persuade to have a body checkup)

After hearing my sister out, I felt very sad for those elderly. I made a promise to myself that I must be filial son when I grow up so that I would not let my parents down.