There's something poetic about my grandfather, but I cannot put a definite cause to this sentiment I feel when I see him. Maybe it's his harmlessly toothless grin. Maybe it's his odd way of scratching his head, forgetting that he was once a brilliant scholar. Maybe it's his cackle whenever someone says something that amuses him.

Maybe it's his intense ignorance of the goings-on in the house, which my grandmother usually takes care of. Maybe it's the fact that I know that whenever I visit him and my grandmother, he'll be sitting upstairs, in his bedroom, with a tray of fried bananas and cake and coffee, blowing his days off as he listens to the droning television in his room.

Maybe it's his overall presence, the smile, the cackle, the scratch, the ignorance, the mundane choice of food, the listening to the television as if it was a radio from days of yore, his unchanged day-to-day wear of a white blouse and sarong, his classic-style glasses, his stubbornness, which I surely inherited. Nevertheless, I admire him, my poetically stubborn grandfather.

I do not know much about this grandfather of mine before he came to be the presence I have just described. Photographs of him during his youth told me as much: he was a fine dresser, choosing to wear mostly suits with neatly pressed trousers and dandy hats, and was good-looking; he adored his wife, loved his three children and was passionate about his job; he was brilliant, well-known and knew a lot of prominent people who showed mutual admiration toward him.

All this I knew from the albums of photographs of him. Several pictures of him and his parents and relatives were found too, in which he was merely a child, forcefully made to sit for the photographer, his eyes paying attention to something beyond the photographer, unlike his smiling relatives.

Then, pictures of him and his similarly aged friend, their arms on each other's backs, their hair slicked back and their shirts neatly tucked into their trousers, their pointedly shiny shoes in the same direction; in these pictures he was a somber teenager at the peak of his rebellion, you could see the determination of a young man emblazoned in his eyes, similar to his friend's. These pictures then continued with pictures of him and in all probability the same friends he was photographed with, but now with long strands of hair, wearing tattered shirts, holding banners of proclamation, the determination he had in previous pictures showed it's enthusiasm.

Fast-forward to pictures of him wearing a suit, and a hat tilted on his head, covering his eyes and satisfied smile. His hair was again neatly slicked back, and beside him were his friends, posing as awkwardly as he was. We have now entered the photographs in which told the first days of his marriage with my grandmother.

The couple, sitting formally next to each other, barely smiling; but after a few photographs, candid pictures of them with their similarly aged, newlywed friends. Then, one by one, more pictures of them, but now with one, then two, then three children; each with his dark, ambitious eyes that bored through you. Fewer pictures of him appeared, and more of his three children and wife, and as this happened, my grandfather became older, became the person I know now, without anyone noticing.

Many admired my grandfather. He was the oldest of seven children and he was a boy, a prominent role in the hierarchy of his family. These seven siblings he had would come, stringing along their children and their grand-children.

These relatives I rarely saw would come a few times a year in indefinite terms except on lebaran, when they brought along seve-ral dishes as a sign of respect and basked in my grandfather's youthful eyes, wrinkled hands and cackles as he listened to their stories. One by one they'd shake my grandfather's old wrinkled hand, who'd still be sitting immobile in his antique chair, drinking coffee and unusually dressed in batik and neatly pressed trousers, reminding me of his youthful days. He'd wait until they were finished informing him of their current jobs, their successful spouses, their newborn children, then, with satisfaction, my grandfather would change from his batik and trousers to his white shirt and sarong and finish his coffee, which was when I would then visit him.

I knew he was immensely proud of his children, even more than his own achievements. Whenever he'd speak of them, there was a certain tone to his voice, it would quaver. He'd speak of my aunt's well-known reputation among international diplomats and her liberal household that consisted of her Western older husband and one child; my uncle's environmental job and prosperous family blessed with three children; and my mother's published works, and me, his eldest granddaughter.

He rarely talked about his wife, but it was a relationship that need not be discussed --the years of loyalty and hard work they both produced were something to be admired. I knew too, that many admired him. Not only the relatives that came bearing food and asking his blessings for this and that, but also the people around him. In his years working as a reporter, he had met countless numbers of people, some of whom occasionally still called and invited him here and there, but whom he politely declined.

But why then does my grandfather continue to sit in his antique chair all day, smoking away his days, reading the newspaper he no longer works at, and occasionally listening to the droning television? What was it now that he thought about? His mind is a brittle stone, hardly empty, one which no one can read.

Occasionally, when I'd sit in front of him and observe his activities as the days melted away, he'd ask something or other about my school, to which I replied curtly and uninterestedly. Where were the relatives with their food that were so obliging to him when they needed something? Did they think visits to him were a necessity and not of one's own wish? Where were his friends, who had once been slicked-back youths together with him? Had they forgotten the nostalgic memories they once shared? Where were his coworkers, whom he had spent years rubbing shoulders with (I imagined a smoke-filled, caffeine-equipped room filled with the sounds of typewriters clacking and never-ending discussions)? Where was my aunt, with the quick, polite chitchat she always produced when meeting someone, and her air of unavailability?

Where was my prosperous uncle with his equally prosperous family and their prosperous lives? Where was my mother with her hectic rants and her concerned questions of people's health? Where was my grandmother, always with her hedge clippers, tending to her flowers dressed in her lavish accessories? Where was I? Yes, we were there. We visited him, we brought him food, we reminded him to take his medicine, we warned him of his smoking, which he eventually stopped, we said our "Hellos" and our "How are yous", but we never talked to him, we didn't look into his eyes, and we never realized this all.

There's something poetic about my grandfather. I don't exactly know what it is. I think it's his whole presence, his whole being. From his toothless grin, to his habit of scratching his head, to his cackle, to his wise nods of understanding, to his asking us to repeat what we say because of his declining hearing in one ear, to his stubbornness in sitting in his room day after day, eating fried bananas and cake, drinking coffee, occasionally smoking, reading the newspaper and refusing to watch television, but rather listening to it like a radio. From all this, to the faint glint in his eyes whenever I come visit him, bringing a tray of food. And behind the faint glint, I can still see the determined fire in my grandfather's poetic eyes

Popular

Stocks in Asia rise, yen wobbles after volatile start to week

In Numbers: How women fare in Indonesia

Indonesia may offer dual citizenship to attract overseas workers, minister says