Unlike the kiasi kiasu kiasimi Sinkies, including both elites and the low SES fucks, refused to die.
87-year-old Leung Oi-Chun reveals pancreatic cancer
Faces life and death calmly. Refuses chemotherapy.
Down to 70 pounds. Hopes to live another year or more.
“I talk to it all the time. If I die quickly, you die quickly too.
As long as I’m alive, you have food and shelter.
You have me, I have you. Let’s be good friends.
Just help me by not causing pain. I’ll be grateful.”
Now 87,
Leung Oi-Chun, long known as TVB’s “go-to maid,” devoted half her life to the entertainment industry. She has retired for many years, but audiences still recognize her face. After celebrating her birthday recently, she revealed on producer and close friend
Yeung Siu-Hung’s online program on the 23rd that she has pancreatic cancer.
Because of her illness, Leung has moved to a nursing home in Shenzhen. In the video, her voice is strong. She looks very thin and weighs only 70 pounds, but her spirits are good. She said frankly:
“Before this, I could take care of everything myself. Now I can’t.
I felt I needed a place where food is served and clothes are handled for me.
That’s why I came to Shenzhen.”
“The tumor is as big as an egg”
Strong-willed as ever, Leung joked:
“I’m a wild horse. Even my best goddaughter can’t control me.
I fought my way through life on my own.
I once said I would never enter a nursing home.
But now, I really have to.”
Touching her abdomen, she explained the diagnosis:
“I kept feeling pain here. I thought it was a stomach problem.
I felt full and couldn’t eat. I kept losing weight. Something felt wrong.”
A former ATV colleague referred her for tests in Shenzhen. Doctors confirmed pancreatic cancer, with a tumor the size of an egg.
“The doctor told me to do chemotherapy.
I said I needed to calm down first, go downstairs for a smoke, then come back.
The doctor said, ‘Auntie, you’re very calm.’
I said, ‘Life and death are fate. What’s there to panic about?’
After my smoke, I told him I wouldn’t do any treatment.
He asked if I needed to ask my family.
I said I only have a grandson. No need to ask him. I decide for myself.”
Strong, yet powerless
Despite the illness, she stays optimistic:
“My legs are weak now. I walk slowly, step by step.
I don’t even know where my balance is.
My shoulders feel cold, my legs feel hot.
Those days were miserable.
You can say I’m strong. You can also say I’m weak.
I don’t get to choose.”
After learning of the diagnosis, she planned ahead. While hospitalized, she asked fellow patients to help her search online for nursing homes. With permission from doctors, a caregiver took her to visit three places. She chose one to live out her remaining years.
“When you’re sick and someone serves your meals and clothes, why not?
The government didn’t approve me at first.
But this ‘friend’ of mine”—she pointed to her pancreas—
“helped me. Once they saw I had pancreatic cancer, approval came quickly.
So I came here with peace of mind.”
Asked if the decision was rushed, she laughed:
“It’s my own life. I’m alone anyway.
Living or dying is my business. What is there to fear?
I didn’t dare tell my grandson at first.
He knows now because my goddaughter insisted.
He can’t handle the burden.”
Talking to cancer: “Can you give me two peaceful years?”
Leung treats life and death lightly:
“The most important thing is to live happily.
I have illness now, but I’m still happy.
I treat cancer as a friend. I talk to it all the time.
When it hurts, I tell it:
‘Friend, don’t hurt me.
If I die fast, you die fast too.
As long as I’m alive, you’re fed and sheltered.
Let’s be good friends. Just don’t cause pain.’”
She added:
“It hurts from time to time. Here hurts, my waist hurts.
I can’t walk now. But it’s not like burning pain.
I asked it, ‘Why come to me? Can you let me enjoy two peaceful years?’
It didn’t answer. That means no. Ha!”
She declined moving to Canada to live with her grandson:
“He’s 34. I’m 87. The gap is too big.
He has his friends. Most of mine are gone.
No mahjong. What would I do there?
Here, I can hire someone to walk with me.
It’s 50 dollars an hour here. In Canada, it’s over 100 Canadian dollars.
Do the math.
And I’d become a burden.
He’s newly married and at the age to build his future. Why drag him down?”
She thanked her goddaughter deeply and cried:
“I used to lose my temper with her. I didn’t even know how to be grateful.
She ran around so much for this nursing home that she fell sick herself.
Without her, even if my son came back to life, it wouldn’t have worked.”
Chow Yun-fat wanted to send her a heated blanket
Years ago, Leung appeared in an
Eason Chan music video. Asked if she would work again, she said she would do it for free if old colleagues asked.
Thinking of the past, she cried:
“When my son died, I didn’t cry in front of anyone.
Only after everyone left.
I live on the 7th floor. I once thought of jumping.
Then I looked down and thought, ‘Seven floors won’t kill me.’
If heaven wants him back and doesn’t need me to care for him,
then dying earlier or later doesn’t matter.”
She said she gained more than she lost in the industry:
“When I entered the business, it was a golden era.
People had heart.
That’s why Chow Yun-fat and Felix Wong are so good.
They suffered their way up.
Even now, old colleagues still come around me. It’s heart-warming.
After my son passed, they all cared for me even more.”
She shared that
Tsang Kong and
Patrick Tse treated her well too.
“That generation remembers people.
Even many younger ones do, like Fat Gor.
On my birthday, he called to ask if I wanted a heated blanket.
I said no, I’m sensitive to heat.
He told me, ‘If you’re in Shenzhen, call me anytime. I’ll send a driver.’
Felix Wong is the same.
I watched these two grow up.”
“If you treat people sincerely, they will treat you well”
Leung said:
“The most important thing is gratitude.
Heaven hasn’t treated me badly.
I lose something here, I gain comfort there.
I lost my son, but gained a grandson.
If you truly treat people well, people will treat you well too.”
She ended with humor and no regrets:
“I ask for one more year, maybe just one year. That’s enough.
I was clever when I was young.
I didn’t mix too much with people my age.
I was afraid I’d have to send them off first. That hurts.
Now I know you all—haha, I’ve struck gold.
You’ll send me off instead!”
