Cephas Hawkins

Cephas was a friend of mine. . .

We started out as colleagues. Me in Penang, and he the other side of the world in Arizona.

We briefly met while having dinner on shift 4 while I was there.

And when I got back, he took care of all the escalations made to the local Fab Support for Fab 22 and Fab 12.

And at some point we became friends.

He would give me pointers on gym workouts, what should be done, how frequently, and the kind of food we should take.

But the sweet part is, he would never tell me to loose tons of weight. And when I hurt my back, he would IM me daily to find out how I was doing. We seldom emailed, as chatting was real time and more effective since we worked the same shift.

Some weeks ago, I told him that due to my reorg I will be moving to the back end shift, which is the opposite of my current shift.

His next words still appear clearly in front of me. . . 

"u leaving me . . .?"

Later that day, he sent me a Valentines Day forward email. . . .

A few days later, I found out that he passed away 

in a bike accident. As I was away from work, I wasn't able to confirm it with my US colleagues till later that week.

I still don't believe it and expect his IM message to pop up my screen when I'm at work.

"I'll miss having a caring friend like you Cephas. But I know you're in a better place and in good hands, because you were a wonderful person"