Still painful, five years on

PETALING JAYA: Australian housewife Jennifer Chong has stopped celebrating happy occasions like New Year’s Day and birthdays after her husband Chong Ling Tan vanished with 238 others aboard MH370 on March 8, 2014.

Allowing herself happiness seemed like a betrayal, said Jennifer, 52, whose world was upended five years ago when the plane mysteriously went missing on its way from Kuala Lumpur to Beijing.

“His disappearance has deeply impacted my life emotionally, mentally and financially.

“I suffer from memory loss and emotional breakdowns and I have difficulty concentrating.

“We have not celebrated any special occasions since, be it the New Year’s or birthdays.

“To be happy seems to be a betrayal,” said Jennifer, who resides in Melbourne and has two children, Justin, 23, and Javier, 18.

The incident also took a toll on her financially as she was not able to take over her husband’s business due to a legal tussle with her brother-in-law.

“My husband was the breadwinner in the family.

“The world doesn’t stop because of my bereavement, there are school fees to pay, children to feed and a mortgage to meet,” she said in an email interview.

Always in their hearts: Nicolette Gomes, with her son Raphael Ariano, eight, at the fifth annual remembrance event of MH370.

Chong, who stayed for the first two years in Kuala Lumpur with the hope of getting closer to the truth, said life got more unbearable as hopes of his homecoming fizzled.

Meanwhile, in Kuala Lumpur, the work roster that MH370 in-flight supervisor Patrick Gomes put up at his home five years ago is still right there on the fridge.

His wife Jacquita Gonzales, 56, never had the heart to take it down as she battles a profound grief and undying search for answers.

“It’s not that it has gotten easier; we just got a little bit tougher and stronger. It has been five years ... I’m just hoping it won’t be six years,” said Gonzales.

Every first week of March since the tragedy, Gonzales would be flooded by memories of her final week with Gomes before he boarded the ill-fated plane.

Behind her closed eyelids, she could see the gold chain around his neck where he hung his wedding ring, and their last Ash Wednesday Mass together.

“I don’t even have to try to remember them, I close my eyes and the pictures are there.

“There is no closure until the plane is found,” she said when met at the fifth annual MH370 remembrance event.

Gonzales’ daughter Nicolette Gomes, 33, did not subscribe to any of the conspiracy theories floating about regarding the missing aircraft.

“We will only know the truth when we find the plane,” said the teacher.