“食饱饭未啊？”

Someone checked out my 'Favourite Quotations' in facebook and then sent me a sarcastic note - "How unoriginal!". Another told me to write something more... intelligent.

As long as memory can bring me back in time, this “食饱饭未啊？” phrase has always lived in me. As a kid, whenever I arrived back at my humble home, my mother will ask me if I had taken my lunch. Then as a graduate student, my home-coming became evening stunts, and she will ask me if I had my dinner. Now as a working adult, she too, will ask if I have had my meals.

And my answer will usually be a 'no'. She will thereafter nag her life off, get up from her comfortable post-dinner TV sessions, go into the kitchen and fuss something up for me. In rainy days, she will take an umbrella and head out to get a take-away from me if I came home with an empty stomach. And she will always nag. Non-stop.

When I have my restful days at home and she is out, she will always call and ask, “食饱饭未啊？” and if I hadn't, she will drop her chores to bring back some nasty nags, and a most thoughtful take-away.

Maybe to the people out there, “食饱饭未啊？” is un-philosophical, lack-lustre, and unintelligent. But if they can read these few words through my eyes and receive them from my heart, this phrase “食饱饭未啊？” is not just another question nag.

It also means, "I love you, son."