Christine

A few weeks back, I took some snapshots of our labandera Tiya Nelly, with the intention of giving her a printed portrait for herself. This inspired me to do a little personal project wherein I fill our home with portraits of my family members. I started out with the two other males in the family, first my father in his papaya grove and then my brother in his wife beaters. Today, it was my sister's turn.

This is my sister, Christine Anne Lee Yuhico. She was born with Down's Syndrome, which basically means that the slope of her learning curve isn't as steep. But that's not a problem, she's still pretty smart. She's the most communicative from all the Down's Syndrome children that I've seen, she has memorized the birthdays of almost all her acquaintances, and she actually learned Filipino on her own. I guess I should thank all these mass media telenovelas for that.

One routine she has is that every afternoon if she's home (and not grocery shopping with my father), she'll make her way to the living room, put on a CD (it's currently Christian Bautista), and play Scrabble on the coffee table. She doesn't actually play the game by the rules (or with an opponent); it's more of her forming words in scrabble-like patterns with the tiles on the board. Of course, her vocabulary is very influenced by her TV shows, so you'll get words like "dagat" and "Diether" alongside your normal English common nouns. What amazes me is the complexity of the words she's able to comprehend and spell. I take a glance at her board, and I've seen the likes of 'sinner' as well as those Korean names that most people over here can't pronounce properly, much less spell.

My little sister has been a constant source of joy to us, especially so after our mother passed away ten years ago. We do have our little squabbles as siblings (part of the joy I get from her is derived from occasional streaks of teasing), but all in all, she's still and always shall be the baby of the family. It always makes my day when I see her trying to hide her ecstasy at being taken to Pancake House for dinner, or when I bring her Coke floats home from Jollibee.

I don't usually show it, but in truth I'm really glad that life dealt the cards as such. From time to time, I do think about what it would be like to have a sister without Down's, but the moment only lasts for a few seconds as I shake my head and realize that I wouldn't have this any other way. She's brought her own special touch to a male-riddled family that I believe a normal girl couldn't do, and we're blessed for it. Now and forevermore shall I cherish my baby sister who stayed in Neverland and never grew up, our own little Lost Girl.