Goodbye, Yasmin

Its hard for me to express how extremely devastated I am to know of Yasmin Ahmad’s passing. When I heard the news of her collapsing and being rushed to the hospital, I honestly thought that she will be well again. My dad had a stroke too and he got better afterwards.

But when I checked my twitter timeline to see friends tweeting about her passing, at first I was in denial. And then it sinked in and I felt so emotional, that the tears just flowed.

She was one of my role models. I first got to know her work while watching The Love Story of Tan Hong Ming. And the first thing that I thought was what an adorable story it was, but it had an under-lying message of being race-blind. Being in an interracial relationship myself, it just touched me.

It was only later when I was chatting with Mintea, that I realised that I had watched quite a number of her works previously. Such as this petronas ad in 2007

I was such a sap that got emotional and cried at each and every one of them. They all touched me.

That made me extremely excited and I was fortunate enough to meet her last year during the launch of one of her campaigns. She was regal, she was witty and she was charming. It was hard not to fall in love with her. She had an elegance about her.

She shared with us on how she overcame adversities being a woman and a Malay by quoting this simple sentence : The thicker and deeper the mud, the more beautiful the lotus grows and that really stuck to me.

And she also shared with us that to be a good storyteller, be it a writer or a director, is not to control too much and just go ahead and share what you know. Many a times I don’t think that I’m such a fantastic writer, compared to others, but what she said gave motivation for me to continue writing for this blog. So I write through my own eyes. No pretences. No bullshit.

Rinaz and Mintea meets Yasmin Ahmad

I could have listened to her for hours.

Later through the year, I managed to catch Gubra with my family and then Muallaf with Daphne. It was unconventional, and as it touched many sensitive topics, it was probably not a film that everyone would appreciate but I loved it. Yasmin had the balls to stand up for herself. And I was looking forward to see more of her genius-ity.

But she’s gone too soon. We’ve just lost the storyteller. And I’m devastated.

Goodbye, Yasmin

pic via Wordlife

Innalillahiwainnalilahirajuun

15 Replies to “Goodbye, Yasmin”

  1. I finally feel how many people felt about MJ when he passed away. Sigh… can’t believe there will be no other films of hers to look forward to šŸ™

  2. I’d actually never heard of her before Her name started popping up in Twitter. Seems like a lot of people really enjoyed her work. I should look it up. Maybe I’ve been missing out.

  3. She kinda looks like Meryl Streep there.

    And oh, my aunt(s) cried during that iklan raya too. I mean, I personally didn’t feel anything deep but I guess her work really does have impact on many, and she will be missed.

  4. 2 of my biggest inspirations – MJ and Yasmin Ahmad .. RIP
    While most wouldnt place them in the same category; they inspire me in different ways; for their daringness to go against the norms

    ZQ
    PassportChop.com

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