東京ターワー by リリーフランキー (Tokyo Tower by Lily Franky)

I finally managed to finish this book on the flight to Bali! That is, it took me months to get through this rather thick novel, partly due to the fact that I started and stopped a few times and had to re-read some of the parts in front every time I recommenced reading.

Through perseverance and a little more reading before going to bed, I finally managed it! Not that the book was hard to understand, it is just that there were a lot of Chinese words in there that I don't even know how to pronounce. Of course, when that happens I usually rely on context reading to understand what is being relayed rather than going to the trouble of checking the dictionary. *grins*

The story is very touching (and has been made into a movie, shown at this year's Japanese Film Festival @ GSC), the narrator is the main character of the story, and the story is about his mother, him and their relationship as well as their relationship with others.

The story reminds me of a very priceless relationship that most young people nowadays just do not seem to realise or chooses to ignore. A mother's love.

The story begins when the narrator is only but a little kid, moving from one town to another because of his mother's pride and his father's absence. It moves on to his teenaged years, youth and finally breaching 30. Chronicalling mainly what went on in his life and what he thought about his parents relationship with each other and his relationship with them and his friends.

The narrator's mother is a single parent who gave up so much and always puts her son above and in front of everything else, she gave so unconditionally and so completely that it made me wonder how she felt when her son was just wasting so much of his youth between the ages of 15 and late 20s. (Her feelings were not explicitly told in any part of the story.) For even then, she stood behind him, quietly supportive whether emotionally (if asked of her) or financially and never once chastised him for squandering his youth away.

The narrator did not accomplish anything at all in his younger years, years where most young adults feel that this is the time to do anything and everything I want. Funnily, I wonder if I or any of us have the courage to do what he did? To enjoy our young lives, not bothering about making money or saving for the future and just living from day to day, wasting time away...

It is not socially acceptable in any society for a young person to do that. But is that a reason to not do it if one so wants to?