Blue balloons drifted slowly into the late-morning sky as a final gesture of love and solemn farewell for 16-year-old Yap Shing Xuen, who died after she was stabbed at a Bandar Utama secondary school last week.
Just before noon, her casket was placed into the white hearse bound for the Nirvana Memorial Park in Shah Alam, Selangor, where she will be cremated and laid to rest.
Each mourner was given a blue balloon – symbolising Yap’s favourite colour – to carry along the short, silent 100m procession. When the time came, more than 200 attendees, including family members, teachers and friends, released the balloons together in a simple yet moving act of farewell.
The sombre ceremony, attended by over 200 people, took place at the Nirvana Centre (Nirvana 2), Seputeh, here earlier this morning.
The casket was sealed around 10am after a Buddhist prayer led by a nun. Yap’s mother, Wong Lee Ping, was seen weeping uncontrollably as eulogies recalled her daughter’s bright and compassionate nature.
On Oct 14, Yap was stabbed up to 200 times by a 14-year-old boy in the girls’ lavatory of SMK Bandar Utama Damansara (4) in Petaling Jaya. The suspect remains remanded for police investigation into the case.
