Mar 21 : Language

Dear Diary,

Joe said, my boss allowed me to take another week off! I don't know how Joe persuaded him, or if my boss is really that nice, but god bless you, boss! You are the best! Or maybe Joe's the best.

Today, sister is home with me again. And as I said yesterday, I give her a test to see how far her reading skill is. Way better than the first time I tested her, but she still has difficulties in some words. Can't blame her on that, our language isn't the easiest language in the world. Even for me, it's difficult, especially when you are working as a postman. Every single day, you will read so many addresses and you need to make sure that those addresses are written correctly. Or when you are delivering the mails, you must not make a mistake in reading the recipient's name.

There was once when I delivered a mail, the name was written down as "Reaharthd", how do you even pronounce that?! So I said that this is the mail for "Rehart" and guess what? The people in the house said there is no one with that kind of name there. Of course, I'm so confused. So I showed the mail and asked them again, "Is this not XXX street?". They glanced at the mail and then exclaimed, "Oh! You mean Reaharthd!". Do you know how they pronounce it? "Raharthode".

Yes, RAHARTHODE.

Why in seven hells do they need to make such a difficult name that pronounce so different than the written name?! I just don't understand, is it how those letters actually pronounce or is this name so uniquely different?

I wonder if Joe's name is actually written down as "Joe".

Back again, sister gets an okay score from me in the reading department. As for writing? She is doing really well! I guess she has been practicing alone all this time.

You might be asking how did I test her.

Actually I get books that Dad and Mom used to use when teaching me. And I still keep those books with me all along. There are three reading books, for three levels of reading skill. So I use the same books to teach sister as well.

For writing, that's a little bit hard to do. We used to write on sand, as we don't enough to spare on a book. Until last year. On New Year's eve.

You might have guess it. Yeah, I bought her a notebook as well. Come on, I'm not that cold-hearted as to only buy a notebook for myself and none for her. Not to mention, I didn't get anything for her last Christmas.

You don't know how happy she was when she received the book. She cried. CRIED.

She shocked me out of my life. I thought she dislike the gift, but she hugged me so tightly afterward and keep saying thank you to me. Her face although full of tears, but her lips were curved upward, even her shiny teeth were showing up.

That was the first time I saw her smile so widely in the last two years.

The smile that has gone the day Mom left us.