dustin shum

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愛在大限來臨時    馮金好

家，本來是讓人領受與分享愛的地方，但對金好來說，隨著疼愛的小狗「囡囡豬」病逝，所謂家，只餘下四面牆。現在她需定期服藥，包括安眠藥及抗精神分裂藥物，吃後會感到手震及坐立不安，於是又要服食抗副作用藥。

人生走到半百，金好腦海不時浮現「死亡」和「大限」的念頭，她坦言經常感到大限將至。她曾想過世界末日時，要跟好友相約見面的細節，「我喺葵涌醫院認識好友小妹，同佢有個永遠嘅約定，若遇上世界末日或戰爭，手提電話都打唔通時，我就會到深水埗警署門口等小妹出現，不見不散」。

已數不清多少個無眠晚上，金好依靠小狗「囡囡豬」的快樂回憶渡過。2001年，她開始養這隻北京黃毛狗，小狗毛色光澤，愛撒嬌，平日喜歡跟著金好落街散步，輕易吸引途人的目光。金好坦言，疼愛囡囡豬，因從前曾經小產失去女兒，把小狗當成親生女般對待。心裡經常記掛女兒，時不時傷心流淚。

37歲那年，她結識了一位男朋友，相戀差不多一年就發覺懷了女嬰，金好滿有期待的等候小生命出世，可惜，女嬰最後夭折，金好就提出分手。囡囡豬雖為她的生命添上色彩，然而，喪女傷口始終是一生一世。「2004年，我喊到收唔到聲，情緒失控，剛剛見社工，佢幫我安排送去明愛醫院，醫生就確診我患有情緒病。」

每天起床，金好心裡總會泛起無形的鬱結，「成日形住自己會死，一、兩分鐘後會死，個心好唔舒服，瞓瞓下又驚死。」2008年，金好獲派長沙灣幸福邨單身公屋單位，脫離一百呎套房的侷促環境，焦慮的感覺依然如影隨形。有時她會帶囡囡豬到樓下公園坐通宵，坐到疲憊不堪才返回單位休息。不過，囡囡豬於2009年病逝 。囡囡豬離去後，金好身邊出現另一個伴，名叫阿輝，由朋友介紹認識。然而， 二人相識3個月後，有天見到阿輝一邊用手打自己的頭，一邊說粗口，自言自語，金好愈說愈擔心，「有時見佢打自己個頭，第二日話頭痛，但佢又醒唔起有呢件事，我可以點做？」

（節錄自《活一生人》攝影文集） 

Love in the time of death   Fong Kam-ho

Home should be a place where people receive and share love.  Home, however, has been merely an empty place for Fong Kam-ho after the death of her pet dog, Peggie. 

Kam-ho has to take medicine regularly now, including sleeping pills and drugs for her schizophrenia. But the drugs make her jittery and make her hands shake, so she has to take other pills to overcome these side effects.

Now that Kam-ho has turned 50, death often enters her thoughts. She says she often feels she will die soon. “Sometimes I wake up in the middle of the night and think, 'Maybe when I next wake, I will find that I am already dead’,” Kam-ho says. She has even thought about what she would do if and when the end of the world comes. "I made a good friend, Ah Mui (“Little Sister”), in Kwai Chung Hospital, and we have a pact that when the end of the world comes, or war breaks out, and we can’t contact each other on the phone, we will meet outside Sham Shui Po Police Station. And we will not leave the place until we see each other.”

Kam-ho’s many happy memories with her dog help her deal with the many sleepless nights. When talking about the happy moments in her life, she will always mention Peggie, an adorable Pekingese with shiny yellow fur that she started raising in 2001. Peggie loved to walk with Kam-ho in the street and would turn the head of every passer-by. Kam-ho said she loved Peggie and treated the dog as her daughter because of a miscarriage she’d had. She cries when she thinks about the child she lost.

Kam-ho met another man when she was 37, and after a year she became pregnant. She had high hopes for the coming of the new life, but then the baby died. And she suggested they should part. Though her life became more colourful with Peggie, the wound caused by the loss of her daughter has remained. “One day in 2004, I could not stop crying and just could not control my emotions,” Kam-ho says. “I happened to see the social worker that day, and the social worker arranged for me to see doctors at Caritas Hospital, who confirmed I was suffering from emotional problems.”  

Kam-ho feels an invisible knot in her heart every day when she wakes up. “I always feel like I am going to die soon, that I will die one or two minutes later,” she says. “I feel very uncomfortable, and I also fear that I will die even when I am sleeping.” 

In 2008, Fong was allowed to move into a public housing unit for a single person. Her anxiety remains, despite the fact she’s moved out of her former 100 sq ft en suite room. Sometimes she would sit overnight in a park close to her home with Peggie and would only return home when she was really tired. 

Peggie died in 2009. After Peggie died, friends introduced Kam-ho to a man who became her boyfriend. However, three months after they met, she found that Ah Fai would hit his own hand and mumble to himself, cursing. 

She looks worried as she continues, “Sometimes I see him hit his own head, and he says he has a headache the next day. But he cannot remember anything about it later. What can I do?”