Pak Pao is a Thai lady who owns an 800 square feet souvenir
shop in an emporium here in George Town. The front part of her shop is the item
display room while a small office and a store room is at the back. She also has
a small Thai altar attached to the wall in one corner of her shop which is just
in front of the storeroom.
I frequently dropped into her shop just to pick up one or
two cute dolls for my niece. Since we are already acquainted, sometimes I also
helped her to temporary watch over her shop while she went off to pay her
bills.
One day a toy salesman came and so happened that Pak Pao
wasn’t in her shop. So he passed me a promotional programmable
electro-mechanical maneki-neko (beckoning cat) and some toy catalogues. The
maneki-neko was a neat toy; it can be treated as an alarm clock and a good luck
charm. The most unique part is that its hand can swing to and fro according to the
set time. I was a techno-handicap, so I asked the salesman to give me a demo
and he set the time to 9pm and interestingly; the maneki-neko’s right hand
swung 9 times and said: “Hello!” 9 times as well. After the demo, the salesman
left and I packed the maneki-meko into its box but didn’t turn off the toy; and
put it in the storeroom right behind the altar for ease of identification.
When Pak Pao returned to her shop, I bid her farewell and to
mind my own business; but I have forgotten to tell Pak Pao regarding the
maneki-neko in her storeroom. This slip of my mind has stirred some interesting
commotion in Pak Pao’s shop…
A few days later, a friend of mine gave me a call and he
said the Kumanthong on Pak Pao’s altar became active and it was able to speak. He
asked me if I was interested to join him at 9pm that day to witness the
miraculous Kumanthong in action. I agreed as I was too curious then.
Soon it was 9pm, and there were around 20 people in the shop
waiting to see the miracle from happening… At this point the Kumanthong altar was
filled with flowers and other offerings donated by curious visitors. And true
enough right at 9pm, the sound of knocking followed by a cute “hello!” follow
by a knocking sound: ‘tok’… there were 9 repetitions altogether.
Everyone showed awed expressions, some chanted Kumanthong
mantra and some holding hands together revering this extraordinary statue. After the crowd had revered the Kumanthong
with some discussions and idea exchanging, they left the shop about half an
hour later; I quickly pulled Pak Pao aside and told her about her new toy: maneki-neko
which I put in her store room a few days back…
The last time I dropped by Pak Pao’s shop, she handed some
candy bars to me as a present to my niece. She thanked me for the ‘mistake’ I
made as she has sold the Kumanthong statue for $5,000 which was about 500 times
of original selling price! Now she has a new Kumanthong… of a quieter type of
course!
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