Long-time visitors to my house might recognise the following picture:



And find that something is oddly missing.

Yes, you might be right. Remember the big blue box with a splashing turtle which hated me? Yeah.

I woke up to this scene today morning. I couldn't help but notice as this was in my direct line of sight everytime I needed to go to the kitchen from my bedroom.

Alarm bells started ringing in my head. "OMG where is the turtle? Did Father forget to put it back after cleaning it?" I then went into the kitchen to find this sitting by the window:



Without a turtle in sight.... OMG! A frantic dash to the phone and a call to Father later, came the reply:

Dad: "Die already!"
Me: "Aren't turtles supposed to live VERY long lives? How you know die already?"
Dad: "Never move already, means die already lor. How I know why die?"

Oh. My. Goodness. I really though turtles are supposed to live quite long lives leh. Maybe he (or she, I never really did find out) got tired of being in captivity for 14 years already. Maybe it got tired of constantly trying to escape the big blue box (it wasn't a big blue box originally. We had to "upgrade" as the turtle grew bigger. Such a nice life right? Very few in Singapore can experience constant housing upgrades leh! =p) and decide to give up and go to turtle heaven (where it can finally mate? =p).

Or as my parents believe, the death of the turtle signifies that the turtle managed to avert a disaster on the household by sacrificing its life to block the calamity from striking our family. (If that is really true, then our turtle is a brave martyr!)

Whatever the reason of its death, I kinda miss it. I admit, I was pretty horrendous to it when I was young. I kept torturing the poor thing by poking it or putting it on its shell when we were both young, and the turtle was afraid of me ever since (I swear, everytime I came close, it will withdraw into its shell. But not for my other family members... Ha. That goes to show how intuitive some animals can be). But, the turtle was a constant sight every morning. And now... a sense of familiarity is gone. Can't help but feel a tinge of sadness. =(

May you rest in peace. Enjoy yourself whereever you are! =D

Update: Apparently, the turtle died of hunger because it was blind and couldn't see where the food was. My mom said that the turtle's eyelids were closed for quite a while, and that it couldn't see the food, and thus, haven't ate for days. And Father buried it in the grass patch down the block. At least it had a decent burial. I thought they would just chuck it into the rubbish chute. =/