The Moonstone Painting – By George Braine
One privilege of teaching at the Chinese University of Hong Kong was the health care provided to staff. On my first visit to the campus Health Center, I was intrigued by the large, colorful paintings that hung on both floors of the Center and on the stairwell as well. They were mainly scenes from around the campus, not accurate depictions, whimsical and somewhat childlike. All eye-catchingly colorful, green and blue abounding.
I later learned that Dr. Memie Kwok, a physician at the Center, was the artist. Her intention in displaying her paintings may have been to cheer up visitors.
Memie was not my doctor, but she was my wife, Fawzia’s. They soon became friends, and I came to know that Memie also kept a popular blogsite, which was filled with detailed descriptions and photos of her world travels. I became an avid reader of the site.
Eventually, in 2011, Memie toured Sri Lanka with Fawzia. Her lengthy account of that tour, which she titled “Fawzia Braine’s Sri Lanka”, appeared a year later. ouring Sri Lanka a mere two years after the bloody Northern conflict had ended, Memie wrote sensitively, showing compassion for the people she encountered along the way. She filled it with dozens of photos. It can be accessed at https://memiewrite.blogspot.com/2012/09/fawzia-braines-sri-lanka.html
But, by the time the blog post appeared, Fawzia had unexpectedly passed away. Within a few days of her passing, Memie completed a painting which she named “Fawzia in heaven”. When I saw it, I was deeply moved and asked if she would gift it to our family. She readily agreed. The painting now hangs in my son’s home in the USA.
Memie must have spent a great deal of time on this exquisite work. The moonstone itself is colorful and finely detailed, and she added 14 caparisoned elephants and 13 golden lions holding a sword in its right hand (from Sri Lanka’s national emblem) to the painting. Eleven lotus flowers, depicting the final achievement of Nirvana, are also displayed. An angel, all in white, with a halo and spread wings, reposes on the moonstone.
Memie wrote a description of the moonstone and the painting on her blog. Here is an excerpt: “Sandakada pahana, or the Moonstone, is a unique feature of the Sinhalese architecture of ancient Sri Lanka. It is an elaborately carved, semi-circular stone slab, usually placed at the bottom of staircases and entrances.”
Later, I chose Memie as my doctor at the Health Center. She listened attentively, grabbing a sheet of paper to draw flow diagrams to explain the causes and effects of my ailments. The patient, not time limits, were important to her. As she got to know me better, she also talked about her elderly parents, their sufferings in China and the challenges they faced after moving to the United States.
Blogger, avid storyteller, world traveler, diver, photographer, painter, social activist, caring physician, and, above all, great humanist. That’s Memie.
