Phantom Reborn

My grandfather-in law's brother (how should i call that in English? Granduncle-in law maybe? It's 叔公 in mandarin by the way) and his daughter, who happen to live in Hong Kong all this while, are coming to Malaysia for a visit very soon.

I could still reminisces how his daughter looked like. She looked a bit chubby, and she was a really caring person back then. When I visited Hong Kong many many years ago, she was the one who really took good care of me. Knowing that I was a kid who into gaming very much, she often lend me her Gameboy (oh, I miss that), and I indulged into it right after grabbing the gaming console from her.

I was about 9 years old then, I guess? Well... she was... still studying... just enrolled into a what we called 'secondary school' in Hong Kong. Thus, the difference as far as age is concerned, is just around 5 years, and that is the most it could go, i am sure about that.

So, all along, I called her "sister (姐姐)", so to show that I'm being respectful. Without noticing it, the truth is, she is actually one of my aunts! Another terrible point to ponder is that, she is actually my mother's cousin sister? How weird is that?

Recently, I was referring my grand-uncle-in-law's-daughter as "sister". My mother immediately corrected me by claiming that I should call her aunt instead of sister; for she is, well... actually my mother's cousin sister.

Things become even more complicated when you translate all these troublesome callings into Mandarin, sometimes you could get an endless noun which bugs you to an extent that you wouldn't want to call that person ever again, especially in front of the elders.

If I were to call her sister, it would appear that I being disrespectful to the other relatives (ahem, in traditional ways... my mother seems to be a pro-traditional individual), on the other hand, if I were to call her aunt, it would appear that I being disrespectful to her as she is not as old as she seems to be.

Perhaps I will call her that after she got married and has kids on her own? Guess not, when a certain noun has been used frequently in reference to someone, it is somehow almost impossible to alter. I think I will just greet her in an atypical way, such as,