Day 105

Today is the 105th day Bee Hooi left us. During these period of time, occasionally I will read back those hundreds of old emails which I corresponded with her during her stay in UK (from 2001 till early 2005). Reading those old emails again reminds me of the time whereby we share our happy and sad moments, up and down in lives, giggle over some minor events and happenings, sharing about personal stuff etc. This includes her experiences in the Harold Wood Hospital, at her new working places, her new friends and colleagues in Swansea, her frustrations, her vacations and tours in UK & Europe, how she passed her primary exam, the delivery of her second baby boy, the joints pain she experienced due to seronegative arthritis, her worries, discussing whether to came back to Malaysia or continue working in UK after passing her final exam and also some other personal stuff and family matters.

And, she loved using this phrase "Nevermind, life is just like that" or "Well, life is just like that". Yeah, i ditto with her in this matter and most importantly, we should live our lives to the fullest.

What Her Friend Says (VII)

It's almost one month since Beehooi's tragic and untimely death,Yet,I still feel her presence in th e dept in my mind's eye all the time.I have learnt things from her too even thou I am much older than her.I think I am now more patient and less critical,and at peace within myself.Thanks to Beehooi for showing me how.

Dr NTan (22nd April)

Bee Hooi, i used to call her Dr Tan (eventhough there're few dr Tan in the department) which sound unfamiliar..as i really respect her as my mentor in all aspects of life.

i was a stranger to everyone when i first stepped into penang hospital at the end of 2005. kind of 'stranger anxiety' i was suffering, shy and anti-social, work-eat-sleep as normal routine, one morning, she delightedly approached me: gan, this is for you! my mum prepared friedrice as breakfast this morning,i ask for extra 1 more person, cause i thought you must be bored eating outside food everyday, let's try homemade food as your family not here...so touched and warm..seriously, i nearly cry...hence she was one of the friends that i would never want to lose...

may her rest in peace, nervana.

Dr Gan (23rd April)

Old Photos...

Old Photos of Bee Hooi and a poem dedicated to her by her ex classmates.

(Taken from School Magazine)

Old Class Photo

Thanks to Dr Chan for contributing the photos.

What Her Friend Says (VI)

The reason I haven't been on facebook is cos I refused to look at it after finding out about Bee Hooi. I knew that everyone was writing in it and I knew it would be painful to read and I couldn't bring myself to read it. Today is the first time I'm reading the threads since last week when the news came out. And as I feared, I am in tears. I hope to be able to attend the funeral tomorrow. I have never attended a friend's funeral before and I can't believe that I will be saying goodbye to someone who was a friend, a fellow salsa dance partner and a colleague.

Watching that youtube clip of her speaking, though I didn't understand what she said was heartbreaking...to know that we can never be with her again. I'd like to think that at least before she first collapsed she had happy thoughts of coming back cos she was so optimistic all the time.

I keep wondering why God has taken her away when she had so much going for her and I think it's because he wants her in Heaven with him.

Dr Divya (31st March)

What her friend says... (V)

Few days back when ppl said she will be cremated in paris, i was very sad coz we won't be seeing her anymore.. Now that she'll be 'with us' for few days.. i still won't be able to see her anymore, as i'm leaving Sunday early morning..

I remember the last time i saw her. it was a Thursday.. She was in charge of icu, doing her periphery rounds with laty in C7.. i was postcall. I knew that she was leaving for Capetown the next day, and be back just for a day before she flew to Paris.. So went searching for her, wished her good luck for her treatment. For some reasons, i felt like giving her a big, tight hug. I did. I had palpitations.. But she was so cool about it.

And we all know, that's Bee Hooi.. Rarely she panics. A good doctor, a loving mother, a caring sister, and a true friend to all of us. That's the last time i saw her. Will remember that last moment with her till my last breath.. May she rest in peace, as she had brought joy to many people's lives and touched everyones heart in very special way.. Will always miss the way she matches her earings with her pendants.. I always looked out for it.

Gosh! I miss her... :(

Dr Anisa (28th March)

In Remembrance....

Few days before I leaving for USM Kelantan...
Felt sad when I editing the DVD...
Really missed Dr Tan Bee Hooi... her face, her smile, laughter and most important thing is the way she encourage me...
She always tell me, don't panic... you can do it... and I will always remember it...
She promises to run the Amata Free Clinic in Mahindrama Temple but she never has the chance...
Now I can't share DVDs with her... the dance movies...

Bee Hooi, as you wished to be addressed, I really missed you...

Meaningful Quotes

Dr. Tan Bee Hooi had this nice habit of getting quotes from the net, printing it out and attaching it to the board of our OT call room. This quote below, attributed to Mother Theresa, was posted by her last year. It remains there till today:

People are often unreasonable, illogical, and self-centered;
Forgive them anyway.
If you are kind, people may accuse you of selfish, ulterior motives;
Be kind anyway.
If you are successful, you will win some false friends and some true enemies;
Succeed anyway.
If you are honest and frank, people may cheat you;
Be honest and frank anyway.
What you spend years building, someone could destroy overnight;
Build anyway.
If you find serenity and happiness, they may be jealous;
Be happy anyway.
The good you do today, people will often forget tomorrow;
Do good anyway.
Give the world the best you have and it may just never be enough;
Give the world the best you have anyway.

Thank you Bee Hooi, for showing us lesser folk how to live life. Mother Theresa would be proud.

Dr Imran

7 weeks had passed...

Yesterday was the 49th day Bee Hooi left us. Time really flies, and although 7 weeks had passed, I still find it hard to believe that Bee Hooi is no longer with us. Everytime I look back at her picture, she seems so alive. I can still "hear" her voice and her cheerful laughters.

I can still recall that morning ~ 25 March 2008 around 8 am, when Goay called me, breaking the cruel heartbreaking news. I was in total shock, totally lost for words and felt like the world was turning upside down. Deep inside my heart, I prayed and I hoped that it was just a lie and not true...

I had lost count of how many times i broke into tears especially the first two weeks. I'm a person who seldom shed tears and I haven't cry so much for ages except when my father passed away 8 years ago. On a side note, I can still remember the scene of Bee Hooi consoling me inside the changing room that morning in May 2003, when I received the bad news that my dad was critically ill in Sarawak and I was so far away here in Penang. I really appreciate Bee Hooi's kind act very much although I never tell her how much that meant to me at that moment.

Although I might look happy from external apperance, but deep inside my heart, the pain and sorrow is still there. I'm still thinking of Bee Hooi most of the time. Bee Hooi, I miss you...

Mother's Day

Today is Mother's Day...

You had always wished and wanted to bring up your two lovely kids personally,

And one of the reasons you went for the treatment in Paris was,

A chance to get well...

And be able to bring and raise up your two young boys,

and see them growing up.

It's heartbreaking to know that you couldn't be with them physically anymore,

And furthermore with another frustrating incidence that occur recently...

The boys might be too young to understand what is going on at this moment.

Bee Hooi, regardless where you are now,

I believe you are looking at them from above,

and you will continue to shower your blessings upon them.

I will continue to keep and uphold you, your kids and your family members in prayers.

Tribute

Penang Hospital Bulletin (1st Edition, 2008)

Ministry of Health/Kementerian Kesihatan Malaysia :

M'sian doctor dies in Paris, donates organs to patients in Europe

Malaysian Society of Transplantation :
In death, she saves lives

Malaysian Medical Resources :
Giving the Gift of Life II

Malaysian Medical Resources :
In Loving Memory of Dr Tan Bee Hooi

Ministry of Foreign Affairs :
Letter from Embassy of Malaysia, Paris

Suffering & Death

The followings were taken from one of the emails written to me by Bee Hooi some time back, in August 2004. We were discussing about illness, suffering, and death as an end to suffering. Bee Hooi was still in UK at that time and that email was written before she was diagnosed with AVM.

Date: Sun, 29 Aug 2004 22:30:16 +0100
From: BH Tan

Dear SL,

I agree that it must be a relief to leave the illness and sufferings. Hmm every life in this planet is bound to suffer, it's just a matter of time and only those in heaven or have reached nirvana is off sufferings in eternity. After seeing people suffer in the hospital, I just think that life is just like that, we should treasure the every moment that we have now as our turn to suffer can come any time.

One of my ICU nurses has just been diagnosed to have ovarian cancer and she underwent chemo and now admitted to ICU postoperatively for observation. I couldn't recognise her when I went into ICU initially until someone told me about her. From memory, she was sweet and cheerful when I worked with her 2 years ago and look what happened to her now? the more we grow up, the more sufferings we will face with, don't you think so? I always think back to the good old childhood days when we were so innocent and had no worries at all!! Now we have more and more responsibilities!

Ya, Life is so unpredictable, bad things or good things can come so suddenly, isn't it? So, we 'd better enjoy every moment that we can before it is too late.................

*Snip*
(I've removed the subsequent unrelated paragraphs in the email)

take care,

Bee Hooi

Reading this email again put me in deep thought. Just like the Chinese saying, ~ 百般感觉，百般滋味, 顿时涌上了我的心头. Although Bee Hooi's stay in this world was short, but she had lived her life to the fullest.

What her friend says... (IV)

I agree that organ donation is what she would do...
It pains me to mention her name in this context.

We all love her as a nice, mild and loving person.
She was patient and she was kind.
No words of evil had ever came from her mouth.
No act of despise had she done on anyone.

Such is the person I remember of her, and such is the image of her that will live in my heart forever. I will gladly fly back to Penang if there is a service in memory of her.

Dr Chan (26th March)

I am still in the depression stage, don't know will last for how long... Can't help recalling the moments that spent with her, how patient was she when I ask every tiny and silly question when I prepared my poster for presentation for the first time, the trip to MSA where we went to eat Ipoh's famous Hor fan and Taugeh chicken and we both laughed when Khor vomited within 10 minutes due to motion sickness... and how she had loved and pampered her children on the trip from KL back to Penang end of last year... All and all of these will now be the dearest memory for me...

Hope that her family can go thru the stages of grieving and so do all of us... Hope that whoever that gets her organs later will be blessed throughout their lives...

Dr Ang (26th March)

What her friend says... (III)

It was but a fleeting moment of our lives, and it is amazing that in the short time that we have spent with Bee Hooi, she have affected us in ways that we never knew she could. Her passing away is so sudden, so unexpected and so cruel...

A void opens up in our hearts, of the emptiness at the loss of her presence. You never really realise that light, that color, that smile, that act until it is gone. Irrevocably gone. No words of comfort can fill the void of the loss. No amount of crying, of regret, of vengeance can make up for what we lost.

Friends, we are all in the Medical field. It is obvious that Bee Hooi would have thought all this out. Despite the risks, she decided to go on. True, she may not have considered dying, after all embolization is fairly safe. She must have struggled with the fact that she may have neurological deficit though. It must have been difficult to know that this procedure could leave you blind, or have loss of higher functions. It would not have been worthwhile to go through the embolization and return as a vegetable, or a disabled. Not for Bee Hooi.

We may think, that Bee Hooi should have planned better, well, you can plan all you want, but things may not turn out the way you want it to be or even the way you foresee. And to all who knew Bee Hooi, she was already planning on her life after returning from Paris. It had not been easy for her, to go through the embolization and crany alone in Paris, what more when she actually have hemianopia after the procedure. Could any of you have gone through it alone, without family? Would you have the courage to walk out on the streets of Paris with visual field defect? And yet in all her correspondence, she never did once show her fears, she didn't want any of us to feel helpless and sad. Bee Hooi is truly courageous. More than me at least.

All of us are now left to pick up the pieces from what she left us. Bits of memories, videos, pictures. And it would not be odd, to find things that reminds us of the fun, life loving, kind, beautiful, friendly person that we have come to love and cherish.

Dying is the easy part, it is the living that is hard. Many of us would have regretted not saying or doing so much with her. I think she would not fault any of us. As much as she can, we are her family at work. To think that she did so much at work, I can only say that she greatly enjoyed working with all of us. She didn't say her goodbyes, and we didn't said ours. But then again, she never really left. Not for me....

Dr Ho (26th March 2008)

爱心医生, 器官捐巴黎

I get to know from Bee Hooi's sister a week ago that there is an article entitled "爱心医生, 器官捐巴黎" (A Caring Doctor, Donating her organs in Paris) on the latest 风采 (Feng Cai) @ Feminine Chinese Magazine (#487) . Belows are the snapshots of the articles. (I don't have a scanner to scan the pages).

(Click on each individual photo for a larger view of the photos and text).

What her friend says... (II)

Those who face that which is actually before them, unburdened by the past, undistracted by the future, these are they who live, who make the best use of their lives; these are those who have found the secret of contentment. - Alban Goodier

Somehow it made me think of her.

Dr Ho (26th March 2008)

Even though I have been in this department for 1year 9months, I really got attached to her somehow... When I am going for my Master Part One, she always tell me, be calm be cool you can do it...

She taught me about blocks...
She taught me about life...
Sorry that i can't dance...

Dr Goay (26th March 2008)

Bee Hooi is a very strong and optimistic gal. Even though she went through lotsa hardship, heartaches and difficulties in her life over the last few years, but she never complaints nor give up. She always look at things in an optimistic way and strikes for the best. How many of us can do the same things if we are in her shoe?

Bee Hooi is indeed an amazing and courageous lady and throughout these years, she had left a huge impact in our lives. I'm glad to have her as my friend. Rest in Peace, Bee Hooi. I will truly miss u deeply. U are such a dearie..... And because of Bee Hooi's organs donation which bring hopes to those in need, She will also continue "living" through the bodies of others..

Dr Chen (26th March 2008)

In light with Bee Hooi's organ donation, Arun wrote this which i think is a well deserved statement about Bee Hooi. "This is a fitting end for a wonderful person, whose humanity lives pass her.."

Friends, i know all of us are really upset about Bee Hooi's going. I was too. but after I read all the mails from Dr Lim Wee Leong, I realised that there was no mistake in her wanting to do this. Many times before this I questioned the decision for her to proceed with the procedure. but now, I understand. What Dr Lim said is so true, it won't be Bee Hooi if she did not stand up and take this chance. I'm glad that Bee Hooi's family has agreed for the organ donation. At least now we know she still lives on somewhere out there.

Bee Hooi, you have been a dear friend to all of us. From now on, I wish you peace and happiness. I hope to see you someday when I pass on as well. Maybe then we can once again spend time gossiping and laughing about the silliest things in the world. I'll miss you terribly, but you have left nothing but fond memories... Thank you for being such a wonderful friend to me... farewell, Bee Hooi, and until we meet again. God bless you always..

Dr Choo (26th March 2008)

What her friend says... (I)

At this point i don't have much to say. I cried the whole day today, but slowly I'm trying to accept the fact that bee hooi is no more here. I only know that after grieving we will have to move on with our lives. But as we do our daily work, we'll definitely be reminded of all the things she had said or done. she'll always be remembered as an Angel in our Lives.

I'm very sure she has only left good and sweet memories for us to safe keep. How many of us will be able to do that when we die? She has never wronged anyone, as far as i know. She has never complained or grumbled about the happenings in her life. She has always been strong throughout trials and difficulties in her life. And we should all learn from her. Although she's not here anymore with us, I'm sure her memories will live on forever in us.

I'll miss her dearly and it's never gonna be the same anymore without her. I just can't help but keep questioning myself, have I done enough for bee hooi when she was around? Have i ever done anything to hurt her or displease her? Have i ever forsaken her when she needed help? I hope not. I hope I hadn't been a lousy friend to her. It won't be easy for me to let go and be merry again, but after this, I'll look at life in a different way. Life is indeed so fragile. but as doctors, we tend to forget that ever so often. It's time to sit back and think, have we done enough for our loved ones? If not, start now before it's too late....

I can't sleep tonite. my heart is aching so badly. I dream of bee hooi this afternoon when i took a nap. She was still as beautiful, with all smiles on her face. She looked really happy. I woke up after that o the horrible news of her death. I don't know if it was really bee hooi coming to say goodbye in my dreams or if it's just my mind playing tricks on me cause i've been thinking about her for the past few days....

Dr Choo (26th March 2008)

WCA, Cape Town.

Dr Tan Bee Hooi had participated in and conducted several trials, studies and researches in the hospital. She had also presented several papers, both locally and internationally.

Photo of our beloved Dr Tan Bee Hooi presenting her free paper at the 14th World Congress of Anaesthesia (WCA) in Cape Town, South Africa in early March 2008. That was few days prior to her treatment of AVM in Paris.

Dance Performances (OT Nite 2006)

Bee Hooi was an avid and talented dancer since school days. She had organised and took part in several dance performances throughout these years. Below are 3 video clips of the dance performances she participated (including the Line Dances) taken with my handphone during OT Nite 2006 (by the Anaesthesiology and Intensive Care Department, Penang Hospital) held in Northam Hotel in November 2006.

Our dear Tacia (big sister)

Those who chatted with Bee Hooi before on MSN instant messenger or Windows Live Messenger will know that Bee Hooi uses tacia as her display name. I remembered few years back while chatting online with her, I asked why she used the name tacia. And the reply I got was something that I never expected. She said she is the eldest sister in her family, hence tacia. How come I never thought of that earlier on? Tacia = Big Sister in chinese. Well, Bee Hooi is not only the eldest sister in her family, she is also a dear sister to me, and to many of us. A sister who is always there to share our problems, giving advices, cheer us up etc.

Kevin :
Bee Hooi is like a sister to most of us, not just a specialist. I will miss her very much.... :-( I was on call with her once in ICU. We were treating a patient who was dying and I didn't know what to do. She stayed with me the whole night until the patient passed away...

Goay :
Oh Gosh!! Am really really depressed!!! My heart is aching... Even i am in Penang GH for the past one year 9 months... Dr Tan Bee Hooi is like sister to me... I kept calling her Dr Tan, but she always want me to call her by her name...

Lee :
Dr. Tan, u are like my sister... gave me advice whenever i have problem.. Cheer me up when i am sad.... i really miss u... i still remember, u do O&G list for me so that i can attend the ACLS course, even though u are post call...u teach me so many thing when i first join anaesthesia..

I will still continue to keep Bee Hooi's contact number in my mobile phone, her email as well as her contact in my instant messenger even though I will never see her online again...

The Final Journey

It was a tough time for most of us during Bee Hooi's funeral on 1st April 2008. A heart breaking and painful moment. Most of us cannot hold our tears when paying our last respect and bidding farewell to our beloved Bee Hooi, a dear sister and a dear friend. Rest In Peace, Bee Hooi. Although this is the final journey for Bee Hooi in this world but it is definitely not the end of her chapter in our lives. Our dear Bee Hooi will remain in our hearts forever.

The Altar

On the way to Crematorium Hall in Mount Erskine, Penang.
(photo taken from Kwong Wah newspaper)

More photos taken on The Funeral Day (1st April 2008) is available at Wang HL's Flickr Photo Album and Lian Chye's Multiply Photo Album.