When Will It Be My Time?

I read the papers with much interest about the coming GE. The "slams" are polite at the moment and nobody is suing anybody ... yet. Well, being rather apolitical (not to be mixed up with being apathetic), I scanned the pages reading about the new candidates and the party manifestos. It would be a shame that I would not be voting this year as I leave for Vienna 2 days before Polling Day.

I recall my father's ( a hard core pro-PAP, very pro-LKY man) concern when I qualified to vote for the first time. "Remember who pays your salary" he quipped once. "Remember who is giving you a good life here in Singapore" he whispered on another occasion. "Remember you want a secure and safe future" he said as we walked to the polling station. I looked at my father and playfully said I was afraid of the hammer (Workers' Party) hammering me and that maybe I should vote them. Without a pause he said, " Lightning can strike you too!" That was my father - a man who saw the greatest change in Singapore from a kampong to a city. He had gone through the war and had witnessed the great LKY's hand in transforming Singapore to what it is today. Dad, born in 1916 passed away at 91 in 2007, so he saw a great deal.

The GE aside, what caught my attention and spoke to my heart was the death of the Italian chocolate tycoon Pietro Ferrero, boss of the Ferrero Roche chocolate company. Touted as the "chocolate god", Pietro was heir to Italy's biggest fortune. Just 47, the CEO and father of three died while cycling in Cape Town, South Africa.

Death, much like diseases and illnesses know no difference between billionaires and tramps; beauties and uglies; the famous and unknowns; royalty and commoners; young and old ... death comes to all. As my Nepali friend Purna use to say - "We all must die ... it is just when and how we die."

The important thing then, is to be prepared at all levels - that tomorrow, or even later today - it might be my time. Don't put off what you want to do - just do it! Don't put off what you want to say - just say it! There is no better time than now, for we can't predict what tomorrow will hold.

If only we could predict when our time is near ... but then again ... do we really want to know? Only God knows. I would leave it at that and pray that when my time comes, that I will be well prepared; That I would have lived my life to the fullest; That I would have been a blessing to many; That I would have no regrets.

I would then be able to say, "Lord I am ready to go home."