The End Of A Bogus Master (假大师的下场)

A cook, Mark from Sabah felt his job as cook cannot make big money, so he moved to Ipoh with his wife. After some thoughts, Mark decided to become Sifu (Master) Mark as this would enable him to make easy and quick money. In order to become a real master, or at least to pretend to be one; Mark bought many Feng Shui and Taoist ritual books to learn up the trick of the trade. Further, this Brother Mark also collaborate with his wife where Mrs. Mark would become a spirit medium or a ‘tangki’. So this husband and wife gang converted their house into a small shrine in the name to save all lost souls.

One day, a victim known as Mr. Fisher (Mr.水鱼先生) who was in very poor health came to Sifu Mark for help. This Mr. Fisher always thought that he was being cursed and possessed by evil spirits so Sifu Mark tried to wriggle his way through playing along with Fisher’s psychology. Sifu Mark first suggested Fisher’s house Feng Shui was bad and it was full of wandering ghosts. Further, Mr. Fisher’s ancestor spirits has no place to sit and that they were all standing at Fisher’s door step because his house has no altar for the ancestral spirits.

Further to strengthen Sifu Mark’s claim, he asked Mr. Fisher to come to his altar so that he can receive further guidance from his spirit medium wife. In a state of trance, Mrs. Mark said Fisher was possessed by many evil spirits and feeding on his life energy. In order to get rid of those spirits, Mr. Fisher must pay Sifu Mark MYR2,000 plus a ‘ang pow’ (red packet) for exorcism service. Even though Fisher has paid for Sifu Mark’s service, he was never healed until later he consulted a medical doctor; and was told that his sickness was in fact curable by modern medicine.

A few days later, another person; Ah Beng came to Sifu Mark claiming that he was disturbed by an evil entity. As usual, Sifu Mark asked his wife to pretend to be possessed by spirit so that he could squeeze some money from Ah Beng’s wallet. However, things didn’t happen so smoothly this time…

Ah Beng suddenly being possessed by a spirit and his voice changed to a lady’s voice. The spirit claimed it was a banana spirit (香蕉鬼) and Ah Beng has invoked it for sex and 4D numbers by smearing his own blood onto a banana tree in a plantation nearby. At this point, Sifu Mark and wife knew that this is a case if they do, they will die; if they don’t, they also die. So die-die the husband and wife tried all available methods to cast out this banana spirit. They chanted mantras but that didn’t work and the banana spirit shrieked furiously. Then the couple remembered the old method of using a pair of bamboo chopsticks to clamp down Ah Beng’s middle fingers and thank God the trick worked!

Unwillingly, the banana spirit wailed that it would return to haunt Sifu Mark and family until the last person down (家破人亡).

Three months later, Sifu Mark suddenly suffered from stroke and he couldn’t move his body totally. Hi wife looked after him for nine months before he kicked the bucket. Then six months later, their only son suddenly became insane and at time he would claim that he was the reincarnation of Guanyin, and at times; he became the banana spirit that vowed to seek revenge. However, most of the time this son only talk nonsense until finally Sifu Mark’s only son ended up in the mental asylum in Tanjung Rambutan.

Later, Mrs. Mark told people that the curse of the banana spirit did come true and now she was the only survivor. Maybe the series of mishaps were just coincidences, or it was indeed the revenge of the banana spirit? Whatever case that might be, I supposed if Sifu Mark was really a learner; then he would not suffer of such consequence. I have dealt with many banana spirits and am living to tell the stories. So, rest assure that if you are from a proper lineage; then you would be pretty safe.

Hunters Hunted (捉鬼被鬼捉)

This is an interesting story happened to me when I was working in Ipoh Light Industrial Estate.

One night after our overtime work, my buddies and I went to a local hawker stall for a cup of hot tea. While we were happily drinking the ‘teh tarik’ (pull milk tea), suddenly we saw Muthu walked past us. Muthu was our store keeper and he was known to be a boastful person. Once he touted himself as not afraid of ghosts in front of those female operators and we accidentally overheard his boastful remark then.

So, in the midst of the night that we had caught Muthu passing us; we certainly didn’t want to miss our opportunity to make fun of Muthu. At least we would like to see him pee down his pants for that night. Call us good for nothing, but that’s how good buddies are; at least to spice up out conversations when we returned to the factory. And also to make fun of Muthu in front of his lover, Cindy. After we had an exchange of eye sights and some whispers, Ali called out: “Hey Muthu, come and join us for the tea session. We have something to discuss with you!”

Muthu seemed to have nodded at a far and he walked towards us. Soon, Muthu was beside our table and we invited him to be seated.

Ali continued: “We heard you are very brave. So, are you willing to accept our challenge to go inside the house of a deceased bomoh (shaman) just off Kuala Kangsar Road and spend one hour there?”

Muthu looked at Ali, without any facial expressions but he appeared to have nodded his head as agreed to take up our challenge.

Having accepted our challenge, we led Muthu to the said almost ruined wooden house and saw him entered into the house alone while the whole gang waited outside at a distance.

Soon an hour passed and there was not a single sound came out from the house. I got a little agitated and afraid of Muthu’s wellbeing. No one wanted to see a friend got into trouble for sure, so I yelled at the house: “Muthu! A…r...e y…o…u o...k?”

There was no answer from the house. We looked amongst each other and before I took a second yell, suddenly a horrific voice came out from the house “Yeeak!!”

We thought Muthu was perhaps in trouble or something like that and all of us rushed towards the house. As we approached the front of the house and Ali kicked opened the wooden door, to our horror; Muthu was not in the house! He seemed to have vanished into thin air!

We then searched inside and out of the house, Muthu was still nowhere to be found. And suddenly, Saiful who was outside of the house pointed his finger towards the roof and shouted: “Muthu! What the hell are you up there on the roof?”

Hearing Saiful’s words, we rushed out and saw the figure of Muthu on the roof but before anyone could utter a second word; he jumped down from the roof into a bush just beside the house. We were all terrified and went for a frantic man hunt in and out of the bush but found no one there.

Feeling almost despair, I picked up my handy and called Muthu in the hope that it was Muthu that was playing planks on us. After the phone rang for a while and someone answered the phone. “Hello, Liew! What’s up? It is midnight now! Didn’t I tell you that your item is in storage compartment A?”

I couldn’t believe what I heard. So, I asked again: “Where are you?”

Muthu said: “In my house sleeping with my wife of course!”

After Muthu said the words, he hung up the phone.

We looked at each other and stayed there dumbfounded for quite a while, and finally Ali gave us all an eye sight hinting: “Let’s get the hell out from there!”

None of us talked about the incident and certainly not in front of Muthu for no one would believe that it was in fact the hunters being hunted by the ghost!

Bruising Marks (瘀青)

It may seem to be a stupid question to ask what can cause bruises to our body.

Naturally if our body knocked onto something heavy and rough, bruising mark shall surface on our body as some dark green or purple spots. It may be out of the blues for some of you who are more scientifically minded to say that spiritual attacks too will produce bruising marks. The difference between an actual bruising and a spiritual bruising is that physical bruising will remain on our body; the spiritual bruising marks will disappear within a few days or almost overnight after a spiritual cleansing ritual.

Having hag-rides and being assaulted by house ghosts are nothing new as I myself have come across many of similar cases. Below is a true case happened to Jessica Leong who happened to have stayed in a haunted house somewhere in Pennsylvania in the turn of this century. In Jessica’s own words:

I sought refuge under the True Buddha Tradition and I can see ghosts. At times, I could see those ghosts wandering in my house pretty clearly. I normally see them standing by my bed at night staring at me. Sometimes they would just jump into the bed and sleep with me.

Being hag-ridden at night during my sleeps were nothing new. My personal experience is that my whole body was transfixed in my bed in such a way that I couldn’t move my body or shout but I knew what was going on around me.

One night, when I was about to fall into slumber, I saw two ghosts jumping on my bed. One male and the other female ghost. After jumping for a while, the male ghost suddenly jumped onto my chest and pressing on me until I was nearly suffocated. Just before I became breathless, the ghosts seemed to be satisfied and left me alone. By then it was already dawn.

I woke up early in the morning to find many black and purple bruising marks all over my body. The marks looked like something have kissed all over my body and strangely speaking, I was wearing pyjamas all night long. It looked like ghosts can penetrate my clothing to do the assault. The special character of these bruising mark is that the centre of the bruising spot would appear deep green or purple and the colour gradually became paler as the spot expended around the centre. These bruising would disappear over a few days’ period without being treated.

Some parts of my body especially my buttock, waist and chest areas are favourite spots of the male ghosts. Every time after those ghostly attacks, large bruising marks could be found on those areas until so much so that those areas of my body became numb and hardened. I couldn’t feel a thing even being hit by my own fists… I am pretty sure those male ghosts that attacked me are quite lustful ones.

I tried many methods to exorcise the ghosts but they seemed to return after a while. I performed the boundary protection ritual at night and that had prevented the ghosts from harassing me but when I turned my body and moved outside of the protected boundary, the ghosts would continue to suck on my exposed body parts. Then I sought help from the lineage guru but all of those methods were quite useless…”

After hearing Jessica’s story, I said to her: “Sister, you got all the tantric ritual wrong… Most of all, you had followed the wrong tradition to begin with otherwise you would not experience those ghostly attacks. From the hear of it, looks like you really enjoyed the process too… Ha! Ha! Ha!”

It Is Only Business Transaction (商业交易)

Perhaps now you don’t really think too much about Thai amulets or statues after reading MagicSEA. To me also to many others who had spent a fortune on these magical items, would not take a second look at those ‘holy’ items turned ‘commercial’ products. However, if you are still not convinced; let me share one of those stories from Edward:

A Malaysian couple, the husband is a Malaysian Chinese while his wife is a Thai.

During one of the trips accompanying his wife back to Thailand, they went to Bangkok and visited many Buddhist temples there while ‘invited’ many Thai amulets. After that the couple proceed to the Northeast part of Thailand and visited the famous Butterfly King Temple.

Happily, they arrived the Butterfly King Temple and as they entered into the temple, the abbot of the temple whom is known as the ‘Butterfly King’ came out and persuaded the couple to buy claimed to be very powerful temple made amulets. But the couple felt that since they already had a handful of amulets in their collections from last Bangkok trip, they declined the Butterfly King’s offerings.

Seeing not able to strike a (business) deal on his amulets, the said Butterfly King immediately shut his mouth, turned his back and walked away.

The naïve couple still oblivious of the Butterfly King’s dissatisfaction and went on visiting the temple and taking photos. After walking the temple for a while, as a customary practice; the couple decided to seek the blessing of the abbot by chanting and sprinkling of holy water.

At this point, the Butterfly King turned his black face towards the couple and very reluctantly, he simply chanted in a very rude manner. Such a haphazard action from the abbot has certainly angered the couple. And after the couple returned to Malaysia, they told their bad experience of dealing with this money minded monk and until today; they still couldn’t understand the behaviour of this monk.

This is how I heard the story. And, let me reiterate that Thai amulets or any amulets in this manner has no real power, the real power is with the money. If you have got the money, you have got the power; at least you can buy the smiling face of the Butterfly King in this case… Perhaps I should just say that it is best just to frame up your money and pray to it every day. If that doesn’t work, at least you can still take it down and buy something for yourself!

Black Hound Blood (黑狗血)

Animal bloods are used extensively in folk magic of the world for various purposes: from increasing a sorcerer’s power to exorcism; and from cursing to breaking black magic.

In Taoist Yin Magic (阴法), the blood of snake, chicken and eel are mixed with rice wine to increase a sorcerer’s soul power. In Java, black cat’s blood is used to defeat a person’s protective magic but in Taoism; the blood of a black cat can be used to cause a temple to be void of gods and goddesses. Just a little quantity of black cat blood will prevent any Taoist gods and goddesses from descending down to that particular temple.

Black hound blood is normally used to exorcise a spirit or to coax a spirit out from its grave. In old times when gamblers have exhausted their idea to get the lucky numbers, they would resort to pierce a piece of long green bamboo into the grave of a dead pregnant woman and then pour black hound blood into the grave to force the woman’s ghost to come out to meet them.

However, according to Edward, there is a temple worshipping ‘river god’ once famous of predicting 4D (lucky numbers) around his place. Many people went to the temple to get lottery number predictions and many of those lucky folks stroke a fortune. As I heard, some of the lucky ones even got a windfall of MYR100,000.

As the saying goes: “a person’s meat is another person’s poison”. While gamblers were celebrating on their windfalls, those underground illegal 4D operators were furious about the river god that seemed to be a little generous in giving out those windfalls incidentally speaking had to fork out from those illegal operators’ own pocket. No illegal 4D bosses were too happy of seeing this ‘river god’ became famous in their expenses, so one night; the illegal operators brought some black hound blood and pour in front of the temple.

Unfortunate for the luck number seekers but fortunate for the 4D operators so to speak, since the pouring of black hound blood, all of those lucky numbers predicted by the medium of this ‘river god’ failed to hit any of the targets. Hence, lesser and lesser people went to the temple of the river god to pay their respect.

So, when asked if black hound blood had prevented this river god from possessing the spirit medium? I would think that such blood is only effective in chasing away spirits of lower realms but not to those higher or more powerful spirits. For example, black hound blood cannot chase away tantric gods for sure as they are offered with blood during summoning rituals. Perhaps this ‘river god’ is just a ghost of some sort, and the scent of blood has in fact drawn some demonic entities into the temple. It is actually these demons that had sacred away this so-called ‘river god’. If this is true, then whoever visited the river god temple will experience with bad luck due to the demonic aura in the said temple.

I have seen goats being beheaded and the oozing blood was splashed onto the idol of Kali as offering to this fearsome goddess many years ago in a private Kali temple in Selangor. In this case, the blood is only used as offerings and not as ingredients of any magic formula. In the western magic, pigeon blood is used to attract spirits of some sort. Of course, the most potent blood is the human blood in all magic traditions of the world. So said, human blood sacrifices are against most of our laws nowadays.

On Mantras Matters (佛咒的问题)

There are many controversies about reciting and playing audio recording Buddhist mantras in one’s home. Proponents would say that by reciting those mantras, all sentient beings shall be benefited especially those wandering spirits. But protesters argued that those type of mantras only attract ghosts and unless a real Buddhist scholar, one should not recite or play too many of those mantras over a length of time. While we cannot be sure if those ghosts can be saved from all sufferings, but how sure are we that those Buddhist mantras attract ghosts?

Mr. Edward has brought us his side of the story about his distance relative, Mike as told by his uncle:

Mike is a devoted Mahayana Buddhist. He would go to the temple and become vegetarian during the 1^st and 15^th day of Lunar Calendar. This fellow will listen to dharma talks and he was asked to chant three kinds of mantras to alleviate sufferings of all sentient beings: The Great Compassion Mantra (大悲咒), Amitabah Long Mantra (往生咒) and the Kṣitigarbha Mantra (地藏王咒). He also setup a Buddhist altar with the idol of Buddha, Avalokitesvara (Guanyin) and Kṣitigarbha Bodhisattva (地藏王菩萨). Mike will chant the above three mantras before he goes to work in the morning and once at night before he goes to bed. At times, Mike also plays the mantras through audio recorder when he is a little too busy to chant.

One day, a friend visited Mike with his 7-year-old son, Boy. When Boy went into Mike’s house, he started to feel uncomfortable and subsequently cried aloud with fright. The friend had to bring Boy out of the house. When the father and son were outside of the house, the father consoled Boy while asking him what was the reason he cried out loud in Uncle Mike’s house. Reluctantly, the kid started to say that he saw many horrible looking ghosts wandering inside the uncle’s house. Some of these ghosts tried to show their ghost faces to the kid which caused him to panic and yelled out from the bottom of his lungs.

So, the question now is weather chanting and playing Buddhist mantras attract spirts into a house?

The answer is almost definitely ‘yes’. Most of these mantras are recited during Buddhist deliverance rituals and by professionals only. In the event of chanting those mantras without any actual ritual to feed those ghosts and then to send them off, then more and more ghosts will congregate in the house and eventually create trouble to people who stay in that particular house.

Thus, it is my opinion that it is no benefit to chant and play any of the mantras at home unless the chanter knows what to do with the ghosts, or whatever answered those summonses of the mantras. By not knowing how to treat ghosts, it is same as asking someone to come into your house and tell him to wait for nothing. Even a person with patience will get annoyed too so to speak.

The Eternal Drunkard (永远的酒鬼)

My friend, Eric bought over an old shop in Penang downtown for his new gourmet coffee shop. I purposely visited him for a cup of coffee before he closed his business at 11pm at night so that we can chat further. I knew that Eric’s shop would not have too many customers after midnight and he used to knock off at around 2am.

So, I was in Eric’s gourmet coffee shop one night sitting in a quiet corner sipping my cappuccino while waiting for Eric to come for a chat.  There weren’t too many customers around and some of his waiters and waitresses were wiping off spoons and cups at another table. Suddenly I noticed Eric brought a bottle of bear and walked from his casher’s counter towards the back quite secretively.

As Eric passed by my table, I asked Eric: “Hey man, are you boozing in private back there?”

Eric gave me a queer glance and tilted his head hinting me to follow. I was curious, so I followed him to the back of his shop and then went into a small room beside the store room. It was quite a small room almost empty but with a small table in the centre and a chair.

I saw Eric put the bear bottle in his hand on the centre of the table and poured some in a mug which was already there. Then he lit a piece of cigarette and put the cigarette near the corner of the table. After that, Eric held his hands in prayer’s gesture and murmured: “Big sister Chow, please enjoy your bear and cigarette. Help me to boost my business and you shall get more!”

Later, Eric hinted me to go out and shut the room door. We returned to my previous table and Eric instructed his workers to close the shop for the day since there were no more customers around. After seeing the last of his workers left, Eric then pulled a chair and sat beside my table and he told me the story of big sister Chow:

“Liew, you know that my shop was formerly a bar. After I took over the place and converted it to a coffee shop, my workers complaint to have seen the figure of a woman squatting at the back of the shop now taken up by the small room we went in just now. At first, I didn’t believe in what they said until one night I saw the figure myself. She always leaned her body against the wall and with her head stooped. No one has really seen her face as her long hair would normally drop covering her face.

Later, I contacted the former bar owner and he said the ghostly figure is probably a lady drunkard who died in his bar one night after excessive alcohol and drug intoxications. The lady was known only as Sister Chow who was once the daughter of a millionaire in town who was casted out by her father because she was adamant to marry her lover. Sadly speaking, Sister Chow’s lover too abandoned her for another lady a few years later leaving Sister Chow alone.

With nowhere to go, Sister Chow would spend nights boozing in bars until daybreaks and spend the days sleeping. Since she was the bar’s frequent customer, the bar owner was kind enough to spend her night drinking at the back of his bar and spent a night there. Unfortunately speaking, Sister Chow was found lifeless by a bar cleaner one morning. Since then, her restless soul was being sighted many times until he sold his business.

Hearing Sister Chow’s story, Eric originally wanted to exorcise the ghost of Sister Chow but a spirit medium said this Big Sister Chow can bring him money. So, he decided to build a small room for Sister Chow to stay and also to prevent Sister Chow from suddenly appearing in front of his customers.”

I am not sure if this Sister Chow has helped Eric in his business. But Eric bought the shop before Penang became the world heritage with MYR300k and now his property price soared to a hefty amount of MYR1.2 million!

Problem With Love Magic (爱情降的问题)

Casting love magic to attract the one you love might not be a good idea after all for the one you love now may become your pain in the ass in future. When your love became sour, then; the person you have loved for so long will become your worst nightmare. Worst of all; if at this time you finally found your true love or soul mate. And, there is no way to get rid of your husband/wife amicably.

A TV host once told me a story of a famous movie star, Cynthia whose beautiful face was destroyed by acid splashed by her jilted husband before she wanted to divorce him to marry another rich businessman, Kenny.

Cynthia was just emerging from Hong Kong entertainment industry about 20 years ago. This rising star subsequently met Johnny who was also another actor within the same company. Johnny was quite popular at that time and of course, he just treated Cynthia as just any other fans and didn’t take Cynthia very seriously.

So said, Cynthia was an ambitious lady, she will by hook or by crook to get what she wanted. In this case, Cynthia tried to get close to Johnny by whatever possible means but because Johnny was then surrounded by pretty lady fans at that time; Cynthia has failed to win Johnny’s heart. Since Cynthia was not a lady who could take ‘no’ for an answer, she resorted to love magic in the hope to win over Johnny’s heart.

One day, Cynthia went to a famous lady medium and asked for her help. The medium asked Cynthia to get a piece of her own hair and the Johnny’s hair. After that, Cynthia must tie a knot with their hairs and then; the bounded hairs must be placed in the middle of a leaf of a sensitive plant (含羞草). Cynthia was instructed to cut the leaf once it shuts and then bind the leaf and hairs with a piece of red string. These ingredients must be brought to the lady medium for casting love ritual.

Cynthia followed the medium’s advice and handled what the medium wanted. As expected, A week or so after the casting of love ritual; Johnny suddenly had a crash with Cynthia. And, to everyone’s surprised the couple married within three months. The couple lived happily ever after… But, Cynthia’s happiness didn’t last for very long…

One year later, while Cynthia was attending a movie promotional ceremony, she met Kenny who was a businessman from a very rich family. At this point, Cynthia immediately recognized Kenny as her true soul mate; and she subsequently having an affair with Kenny. Being a person of rich and famous, Kenny cannot tolerate an affair. So he gave Cynthia an option: to go with him or to return to Johnny. But before Cynthia can live with Kenny, she must first divorce Johnny first.

However, Johnny was not ready to divorce Cynthia perhaps the love spell still worked or he really loved his wife now. Cynthia returned to the lady medium but the medium has passed away. Other sorcerers also failed to make Johnny part with Cynthia. As a last means, Cynthia filed a single sided divorce case with the court but while waited for the case hearing; Johnny splashed sulfuric acid onto Cynthia’s face and critically injured Cynthia. This attack not only destroyed Cynthia’s acting career, but also her relationship with Kenny.

Personally, I have consulted many ladies or gentlemen with the same situation as Cynthia. In many cases, the astrology chart of these folks showed that they were not about to marry yet. But, almost all of them were married with partners not related to them somehow. No wonder these people keep complaining of their spouses. This is a very interesting finding indeed.

Raped By Ghost (鬼奸人)

A friend brought a very interesting question: can spirits sexually assault a human being?

At the first glance for a ghost to have physical contact with a person because logically speaking, spirits are formed by gaseous substances and hence it cannot physically assault anyone or anything. However, a spirit will try to force enter into the body of a person through body openings such as nose, ears, mouth, eyes and also genitals. Once a spirit entered the body of a person, we say the person is ‘possessed’. Perhaps it is the sensation of penetration through the body openings especially the genitals that gave the impression of the victim was being ‘raped’. So said, such a phenomenon is very rare indeed.

Alice who returned from visiting her sister in the US claimed to have been physically raped by a ghost. According to Alice, her sister’s house was believed to be haunted by the ghost of former tenant who died in the living room.

One night while Alice was sleeping in her sister’s guest room, she felt the approach of the figure of a middle aged man.  The discovery was too late for Alice as she suddenly found she couldn’t move her body as if there was an invisible force bounded on her. So she couldn’t do anything but let the ghostly figure started to kiss all over her body. Later, as claimed by Alice, she felt the sensation of penetration into her genital which Alice said she was as if making love with a person.

Alice said that she fell into slumber in the process of being spiritually assaulted. The next morning, as soon as she woke up; Alice immediately inspected her body. Although her clothing remains intact and the blanket remained on her body when she opened her eyes, she discovered that there are bruising marks on her body. On further inspection, Alice found there was blood stain on her underwear which gave her the suspicion that she was somehow ‘raped’ by the ghost but other than that; there was no other noticeable physical injuries.

While I have heard of many cases of bruising marks left after being assaulted by ghosts, victims actually reported to be raped by ghosts are rare. Hence I suspected that the ghost or whatever it might have been didn’t mean to kiss and assaulted Alice. Instead, it was trying to find a ‘hole’ to go into hence producing the sensation of kissing and penetration. But unless there are more cases to be examined properly; it is very difficult to draw a general conclusion.

Feng Shui Terms For Cursing (风水骂人术语)

There are many Feng Shui terms used by the Cantonese people to curse others. I just learnt some from my fellow colleagues and the below terms are meant for sharing purposes only as it is not so good for the one who curses; and also the one being cursed. Practically no one would use the below terms these days outside Hong Kong or Guang’dong areas:

1.       Selling salted duck egg (卖咸鸭蛋): meaning to die and become a ghost. The old people believe when a people died, his/her soul will become ghost. And the salted duck eggs are one of ghosts’ favourite food. So, by asking someone to ‘sell salted duck egg’ means to ask him/her to ‘go to hell’.

2.       Nailing cover (钉盖): meaning nailing ‘coffin’ cover also means ‘to die for sure’. You see, when a corpse is placed in a coffin with the coffin cover securely nailed; there is no way for this person to literarily ‘come out again’.

3.       With the ground collapsing/pouring (趁地塌/淋): Both terms refer to the grave of a person suddenly sinks, collapses, soaked in water or being poured by water. These are very bad terms used to wish that the person would cannot rest-in-peace and also all his descendent will also be affected. By using these terms, directly means the person and all his descendent are cursed to have no good ending.

4.       Cannot decay (唔化): This is a Feng Shui term used to describe when a corpse became mummified and failed to decay. In ‘yin’ feng shui, when a body failed to rot, then all the descendent will face some very bad consequences. In another way, the ‘cannot decay’ may also mean ‘failed to digest what the ancient’s wisdom’ (食古不化).

5.       The whole family prospers (含家富贵): in short, this term simply refers to ask the whole family to ‘go to hell’. For normal folks, the only time they can become ‘prosper’ are when they died. This is because the dead are normally being offered a large quantity of paper ‘gold ingots’ and ‘silver ingots’ so to speak.

6.       Returning to Mount Tang/Great Grandpa’s Mountain (返唐山/大伯公山): Both terms literarily mean ‘to return to the grave’. In old days, people who worked in a foreign land would want to be buried in his/her homeland and the graveyards are normally located on a mountain. So, by asking a person to ‘return to Mount Tang’ means to ask someone to ‘go back and die there’. And, to ask someone to return to his/her Great Grandpa’s Mountain meaning to ask the person to be buried beside his/her ancestors.

All of the terms must be cursed in Cantonese to bring out the flavour however as those cursing terms carry no meaning once translated to English or any other dialects. These cursing terms can also be combined to add to the spice of the curse. For example:

“So-and-so, you are a failed to decay one! You go and quickly have your coffin nailed and go to sell salted duck eggs quickly. Hopefully your grave would collapse and be soaked then your whole family would prosper!”

Unfortunately speaking, I cannot make up more acute sentences than those old men and old women in the street. I am sure, armed with the above basic terms; you will catch one or two phrases hidden within those street conversations. Sometimes the ones who said those terms don’t mean bad; it is just a habit and custom within local folks to speak in such a way. So, foreigners and tourists be warned and heads up.

Big Uncle Second Uncle (大二爷伯)

Somehow the Malaysian Chinese worships very different sort of deities from those in Hong Kong and Taiwan.

Normally speaking, people outside Singapore and Malaysia would not touch those ‘yin’ spirits (阴魂) as they are believed to bring bad lucks and death. Two of those ‘yin’ characters are the so-called ‘Big Uncle’ and ‘Second Uncle’. These two uncles are believed to be tasked to fetch a dead soul to the local lord temple (城隍庙) for further judgement. This is very different for the outside world as the task of bringing a dead soul falls onto the shoulder of the ‘cow head and horse face’ (牛头马面) and the interrogation place would be in the hell and not the local lord temple.

It is very difficult to judge which is correct or otherwise. If we analyse further, the local lord belief falls under Taoist influence while the hell is mainly Buddhist system. So, if you asked me where would a dead soul go; I am as blind as you honestly speaking.

Another very interesting belief is that the Big Uncle and the Second Uncle somehow are bestowed with power to give fortune; but the Buddhist’s cow head and horse face are not allowed to give money. Maybe this is the reason why the Big Uncle and Second Uncle are widely worshipped by Sing-Ma folk religions. But is it worthwhile to beg for money from those ‘yin’ spirits? Are they so willing to help and not asking for any favours? A friend of mine just told me his story today:

This story was told by Edward’s friend, let us just call this gentleman Beng who is a 4D lottery fan.

One day, Beng went to the shrine of Big and Second Uncle to ask for a good luck charm. The spirit medium who was possessed by one of the uncles wrote a charm for wealth and luck for Beng. The good luck charm really worked! According to Beng, one night he saw the apparition of the Big Uncle in front of him and the next day, Beng won MYR15,000 from his lucky number. Beng was certainly very happy and excited but his joy only lasted for about 5 days.

On the 5^th day, Beng’s grandmother passed away and then his grandfather also passed away; and his neighbour who was ill for quite some time also died within one month’s time after Beng’s windfall.

Now the question remained to be answered is: was it a coincident or was it that the Uncles who had taken the lives of those old folks after bestowed the fortune to Beng?

It is actually hard to judge unless we can inspect the astrology of all those who had died. But in the 8-Characters (八字) there is a saying that goes:

财运，事业伤母辈。

Fortune (money) and career harm motherly characters.

Accordingly, it is not a nice thing if a person suddenly gets a windfall or being promoted as these sudden changes hurt his/her mother-sides. So, I would be particularly careful with sudden promotion which bring in huge fortune for this would almost follow with a sudden family problem.

I am not quite sure what happened to Beng’s case, but the sudden winning of MYR15,000 might have taken away the lives of his relatives; or it could be the ghostly Uncles wanted some repayment in life terms after bestowing with money. Whatever case it might be, it is better to keep away from those ‘yin’ characters for good.

The Book Of Three Lives (三世书)

The ‘Book of Three Lives’ is a type of Chinese folk fortune telling method which can analyse a person’s past, present and future life. Proponents believe the 3-Lives can accurately pinpointed out a person’s present life problems through diagrams, but since the 3-Lives method lacks some more solid theoretical background; it is not accepted as part of mainstream fortune telling methods by Chinese scholars. Hence the 3-Lives is only preserved amongst working classes rather than scholars of upper class.

A few years ago, A Hong Kong actress’s boyfriend was diagnosed with advance stage of lung cancer and the doctor has expressed that it would take a miracle for the man to recover fully at that time. Without first notifying her boyfriend, the actress whom was known as Alice first went to consult an old gentleman known as Mr. Chao (曹先生) said of very proficient in performing life continuity ritual (续命) ritual.

The old Mr. Chao started to write up a letter which would then be forwarded to the heaven for life continuity purpose. Strange things happened to Mr. Chao as the normally routine letter write up had proved to be very difficult to complete. So, Mr. Chao told Alice that he couldn’t help her to prolong her boyfriend’s life perhaps it was his fate to die young.

After leaving Mr. Chao’s place, Alice wasn’t ready to give up as yet. She then visited the 9^th Aunt (九姑) for reading her boyfriend’s 3-Lives. After the 9^th Aunt flipped over her Book of three Lives, she adamantly said that there was no hope for Alice’s boyfriend but strangely speaking; her boyfriend was destined to die from falling to death and not from his lung cancer.

The 9^th Aunt further showed Alice a picture in the Book of Three Lives that has clearly shown the image of a man pushing a woman down from a red building. The 9^th Aunt further explained that in previous life, Alice’s boyfriend had killed his wife by pushing her over a red building causing his wife to fall to her death. So, in this life and due to karmic reactions; Alice’s boyfriend would also fall to his death.

Though both Mr. Chao and the 9^th Aunt have predicted that Alice’s boyfriend cannot be saved, Alice was still half-hearted of what was being told to her. Nevertheless, Alice kept her visits to Mr. Chao and 9^th Aunt to herself.

Truly enough, A few days later; Alice’s boyfriend went up a car park in Tsim Sha Tsui (尖沙咀) and committed suicide by jumping down from the top floor of the car park. Coincidentally speaking, the car park was painted with red.

Was that a coincidence or was that destined?

Mind Your Actions (谨慎言行)

It is a common local belief that ghosts are afraid of fierce people. So, the louder and dirtier words that can be uttered from your mouth the better it is to drive away ghosts. But, is this always the case? I can tell you this story, but please don’t try it for I shall not be held responsible to what happened to you later:

During my school time perhaps in the early 80’s, some of my school mates from Aulong new village learnt Mao’shan god’s strike (神打) from an old sorcerer. As I was told that the god’s strike mainly invoked the presence of ghosts while the god’s invulnerability (神功) invoked the presence of gods. Having said so, no one could be sure what possesses a practitioner as no spirit would claim to be a ‘ghost’ anyway.

In those days, youngsters of 15 or 16-years-old would think they could take up the whole world with their god’s strike. And, one of my friends; Kow even believed to be possessed by monkey god in the science class and jumped onto others’ desk causing huge commotions in the school. The monkey god asked the science teacher for banana but the teacher passed him a shoe instead. Consequently, the monkey went amok and grabbed the students’ workbook and then threw at the teacher.

The school subsequently called up the local hospital and the monkey god was subsequently being bounded into a stretcher and spent a few days bed ridden.

Then, in order to test the powers of god’s strike, those young ones would go to the Chinese cemetery at night to challenge those ghosts in the cemetery. A game they used to play was to summon ghosts with an oil lamp and a piece of white cloth. The cloth is stretched by two persons each holding onto one end. And then an oil lamp is lit in the background. When this is done, the kids would start chanting mantras to summon the ghosts. After a while, some shadows would be seen on the white cloth.

Once I followed Kow’s group to the cemetery to ‘play ghosts’ (玩鬼) and on our way back home, as we passed through a narrow mud path; many pebbles flew at us striking our bodies and caused many bruises and swollen parts. Interestingly, as we ran for cover; we could hear many cursing and swearing voices around us. The Mao’shan master later warned us to behave because we have offended the good brothers and sisters in the graveyard.

Of course, the kids never learnt. During one of the Ghost Months, Kow was challenged to go to the grave of a deceased pregnant lady with stillborn. He was to sit in front of the gravestone and start cursing the pregnant lady for half-an-hour or so. If Kow has successfully completed the challenge, we would give him $20 as reward. FYI, $20 in the 80’s was a lot of money then.

So, right on full moon night, we sent Kow to the cemetery entrance and let Kow went into the cemetery with me as the witness.

We arrived at the lady’s grave after 10 minutes later. Kow sat directly in front of the tomb stone while I sat on the left side of the grave witnessing what Kow did. Once Kow started his four letter words, I started to take the time.

About 10 minutes or so, Kow didn’t show any signs of tiredness; four-letter-words continued to burst out from his mouth fluently. For once I thought had Kow be so fluent in his languages, he would have been a lawyer by now. Then, from a distance, I saw a white mist started to take shape in front of Kow while he continued to churn out the four-letter-words.

At some point, Kow suddenly became silent and stared at the tomb stone in front of him. Then he yelled out horrifically and fainted in front of the grave. At the same time, I saw the white fog transformed into the rough shape of a lady holding her baby. The ghostly figure first looked at fainted Kow and then she turned her face at me and gave me an eerie yet sinister smile.

I too yelled my lungs out and ran in panic towards the gang that was waiting at the grave entrance leaving unconscious Kow behind.

Kent caught hold of me as I ran passed him and he asked: “What happened?”

I pointed my finger towards the darkness and said: “It’s Kow…”

Kent asked: “What about Kow? He is just right behind you…”

I turned my head and there I saw Kow was indeed right behind me! He was with the weirdest expression since I knew him. His half angered and half smiling face gave me the creeps.

Before the gang wanted to congratulate Kow for successfully completed the challenge, Kow uttered some words without opening his mouth: “You dead kid’s wraps (死仔包) disturbing my peace and scolding me four-letter-words for nothing! You must ask your parents to make offerings and apologize in front of my grave tomorrow morning or this kid (Kow) would accompany me to the underworld!”

After that, Kow dropped onto the ground unconscious. We had to carry Kow back to his home and the whole gang was being scolded again.

The next morning, our parents went to the pregnant lady’s grave to express their apologies but Kow just wasn’t his usual self anymore. After the incident, Kow became a little bit wacko as his words didn’t make any sense. At times he would come to my house and talked a lot of nonsense and after that, I have not seen Kow anymore until I shifted to Penang.

So, the moral of this story is: please use the four-letter-words wisely or the risk is yours! Ha! Ha! Ha!

Hanging Up Life (吊命)

The so-called ‘hanging up life’ ritual is a way to prolong the life of a terminally ill person for one or two days so that the love ones from a long distance can return in time to see the dying person for the last time.

My friend, Lee was working in US suddenly received an emergency call from his sister that his father was terminally ill and he was wanted to return home as soon as possible. In the hope to see his father for the last time, Lee immediately dropped everything he was doing and made arrangements to return to Penang. It took two days to reach his home and many relatives were already beside his dying father’s sickbed.

Lee’s pa looked at Lee for the last time and said: “Finally I can see you for the last time! I can at least rest in peace.”

After saying the last words, the old man passed away peacefully.

The doctor immediately checked the pulses and heart beats of Lee’s father and then pulled out a piece of talisman tightly grasped in his father’s hand; and passed it to Lee. The doc said: “It is perhaps this talisman that has kept your pa continue to live until now. I didn’t know your old man was a master magician after knowing him for so long!”

Other than using the ‘fu’ (符箓) or talisman, traditionally Taoists would use ghosts to prevent a dying person from giving out the last puff. People believe that when a person is dying, those ghosts would stay around the dying to inhaling his/her remaining life force. When a dying person is seen gasping for air, it is in fact that ghosts are sucking his/her life force and preventing the person’s soul from leaving the body. Because once the dead soul left its body, the ghosts have no more life force to feed on. So, those ghosts would try all available means to prevent the person’s soul from leaving; hence in directly prolonged the life of the dying for a day or two.

If you ever wonder what good is it to keep a person from dying peacefully? The answer can be significant: if a person must stay alive awaiting for a love one to arrive and sign a will or some document; then an additional one day of death deferment would have a great significant in legal matters or in the court of law. Of course, once the required job is done, then the ghosts would be exorcised so that the person can finally rest-in-peace.

Once I was visiting another friend’s dying old pa who was panting for air and as he looked quite painful, my pal’s uncle who was a practising Taoist then asked the dying if he wanted to go a little more peacefully. The old man nodded. So his uncle drew some characters on the old man’s body and right after the completion of the ritual, my pal’s father passed away peacefully. His uncle then explained that the old man had infect died, it is actually that his soul was prevented from leaving by those energy sucking ghosts.

Unless it is necessary, this hanging up life ritual should not be carried out as this could cause sufferings to the dying as his/her soul cannot depart peacefully. In Tibetan Buddhism, any delay in the process of dying may cause the dead soul to miss its opportunity to see the clear light; hence missing its opportunity to be liberated too.

Ghost Talks (鬼吃泥)

Ordinary people will not be able to understand what ghosts tell them for the language of ghosts would sound like people talk with a mouthful of soil in their mouth. The Cantonese call this type of ghost talks as ‘ghosts eat soil’ (鬼吃泥).

Fiona told me of her encounter with a stranger without any facial expressions who continued to talk to her for about 5 minutes or so in a language that she couldn’t understand. Though Fiona tried very hard to make sense of what the stranger wanted to express:

One afternoon, after an appointment with her doctor, Fiona waited at the carpark roofed walkway of a Penang hospital with her Indonesian maid for the rain to stop. It was around 4:30pm and the rain hasn’t shown any sign of subsiding, while waiting impatiently for the rain to ease so that Fiona could get to her car; a stranger without any facial expressions approached Fiona and started to talk to her in some cryptic language that she couldn’t understand. Although Fiona hinted to the gentleman that she wasn’t interested in his conversation, the stranger continued to talked for 5 minutes or so and then vanished into thin air.

Surprised of what she had experienced, Fiona asked her made: “Did you see the man who talked to me just now?”

The maid’s answer somewhat troubled Fiona further: “No, mam. You were talking all by yourself and constantly hinted me to go away. I was about to ask you where should I go…”

Only later that Fiona remembered that the stranger somehow looked like her distant uncle who died a few years ago in the same hospital. My advice to Fiona was that perhaps her distant deceased uncle wanted some offerings made to him. After all, the Chinese ghost month was around the corner when Fiona met her thought to be ghost of an uncle.

Being a sorcerer of many lineages, during one time I too kept hearing people talking near my ears while I fell asleep. Some of those words were intelligible but most of those words were just like someone were talking in a language that was out of this world. I could hear audible voice whispering beside my ears trying very hard to convey what it wanted to tell me but at the end of the day, I couldn’t make any senses out of it. So, at times I had to tell those voices to shut up or say in a language that I could understand. But those hard to understand messages continued to pour into my ears until I decided to stop all those ghost magic or else I would become crazy for sure.

Maybe what modern ghost hunters do by recording down all those ghost talks and analyse them with a voice analysing software is a wise approach. If I learnt those modern electronic gadgets earlier, perhaps I could have picked up many important ghostly information from other side. So said, I am a little too old for going back to ghost magic and tempering with electronic gadgets nowadays. As the saying goes: “you can’t teach old dog new tricks.”

The Missing Flip-flop (失踪的拖鞋)

Clara was a university lecturer from Taiwan teaching in a public university in Pennsylvania, US many years ago and she was a faithful Buddhist too. She said that the house she rented while she was in Pennsylvania was pretty much haunted.

One night while she was reviewing her students’ dissertations in her bed, she heard someone called her name. Without any doubt or hesitation, she casually acknowledged the call as she thought it might be one of her friends. Although afterwards Clara realised that she was staying alone in her house and there was no housemate whatsoever. After she searched around her room, Clara found nothing around but a gust of cold breeze was blowing towards her. Being a learnt scholar as she touted herself, Clara paid no attention to the incident. She then tugged away the dissertations and switched off the light and sleep.

The next morning, Clara woke up and after taking some lazy stretches on her back; she lowered her head to search for her flip-flops. To her surprised and bewilderment, Clara could only find one flip-flop beside her bed and the other one was nowhere to be seen or found. Clara remembered that it was her custom to park her flip-flops nicely by her bed every night so much so that this has become her routine. Being a person who paid particular attention to every details, Clara scrutinized her routine last night from the time she came out from bathroom to the time she went to bed and she was damn sure that she had not made any mistakes in displacing one of her flip-flops, she kept asking herself where could the other slipper be?

There was no logical explanation as there is only one bed in Clara’s almost empty room. Determined to find out whereabouts of her the other missing flip-flop, Clara started to search high and low within her bedroom but nothing could be found and Clara kept murmuring to herself: “There must be a logical explanation to this… a flip-flop cannot disappear without a logical explanation… why is it that the other flip-flop remains as where it is?”

About two weeks later, Clara’s friend Joanne came to visit her and Joanne was also a lecturer from Taiwan. Both of the ladies were good friends and they used to sleep together during their school time. So, this time; Clara invited Joanne to sleep in her bedroom so that they could have an all night’s chat to catch up their old times.

At one point, Joanne told Clara her strange encounters with spiritual world. According to Joanne: “Please don’t acknowledge any voices calling your name at night wherever you may be or very bad consequences may happened! I once responded a voice called my name when I was on a scooter one evening and guess what? The next morning, my scooter rammed into a big tree and I was hospitalised for one whole month!”

Hearing Joanne’s words, Clara giggled and then laughed out loud. She made fun of Joanne: “Come on man, you call yourself a senior lecturer believing in those old grandma’s story? I heard someone called my name but I only lost one flip-flop! Ha! Ha! Ha!”

Just as both highly educated lady lecturers were laughing out loud, suddenly a disembodied voice was heard in the air: “CLARA!”

Almost instinctively, Clara replied: “Yes! Who’s calling?”

As soon as Clara acknowledged the call, suddenly a flip-flop dropped in front of Clara; in between Clara and Joanne! There was an immediate moment of silent, and both ladies looked at the flip-flop. It was Clara’s missing one alright. Then, both Clara and Joanne started to yelled hysterically and rushed out of the house in the middle of the night, in the middle of the winter.

As I was told by Clara later, they squatted in Joanne’s car for the night and eventually rescued by her neighbour. Since then, Clara vowed that she would not enter her house alone again.

The Party Animals (派对动物)

It is very important that we must pay particular attention when we purchase or rented a second hand house specifically speaking for if we get a haunted house, then not only we have bear with the ‘contents’ of the house; we might lose a large sum of money if we must resale the premise or break the contract. There is a way to know if a house comes with surprises is that for the first time before you step into the house, then just step your left foot in when you are at the brim of the main door with your right foot outside of the door. Now, close your eyes and feel the atmosphere around the house. If you feel the house is filled with people as if having a party, then beware.

Johnny from Taiwan moved to Philadelphia around 1997 and he happened to stay in a famous local haunted double story building which is located in the centre of the city. He stayed in second floor while the first floor was a sundry shop. When I asked Johnny why he had to put up with the ghosts there, he shrugged and said that he didn’t want to breach the contract and pay a hefty amount of money.

According to Johnny, a week after he moved into the haunted building, he felt someone would pull off his blanket at night while he was fast asleep. At first Johnny thought it was due to his habit of kicking off the blanket in his dreams, but during one of those occasions; Johnny was pretty sure that he was still sober thinking of his work in his bed. Suddenly he felt his thick blanket was being pulled from his feet. All of a sudden, the blanket flew away from Johnny as if someone was peeling a banana. And as a result, Johnny felt that as if he was forced to strip in his bed and he had to shiver in cold at night. At times, Johnny would sort of playing tug-of-war with the invisible force trying to secure his blanket but sad to say; Johnny was normally on the lose end. Once as recalled by Johnny, in a fight to secure his blanket; Johnny felt his body was lifted into the air and his blanket just being pulled away from his body in the mid of the air. And the, he just took a free fall from a height into his bed after the invisible force was gone.

Gradually, Johnny felt something started to jump in his bed after pulling off his blanket. These invisible thing then shouted and yelled at him as if they were amidst a party.

One night, Johnny woke up at night to pee. After he came out of the toilet, he saw rows of people went into his living room. Feeling curious, Johnny followed those mysterious folks into the living room and there he saw a group of people was partying. They were dancing, singing, drinking and yelling the top of their voices. Some of those party people saw Johnny, they grabbed hold of him and forced him into the living room to dance with them. The party lasted before dawn and as soon as the party folks dispersed, Johnny became so tired that he just found himself sprawled in the centre of the living room alone.

Since the first nocturnal party, Johnny were forced to join those ghostly parties almost every weekend he was in the house. Johnny said he had tried every method to stop those party animals from having party in his house but of no availed. Even those Taoist talismans and Buddhist mantra and mudras didn’t help. Since Johnny couldn’t terminate the contract, he spent most of his time in his friend’s house until the end of the contract. The first thing he did after the end of his contract was to return to Taiwan.

Johnny said: “Though the ghosts in Taiwan are scary, they would normally make some noises and leave you alone. Ghosts in US are more aggressive in nature and they are meant to make their presence known.”

Eastern Folks Meet Western Ghosts (东方人西方鬼)

Philadelphia is Pennsylvania’s largest city and it is believed to be quite haunted too as a Chinese lady painter and her hubby found out the hard way.

Mary is a lady painter migrated to Philadelphia with her hubby and bought a double story house there but now choose to settle in Canada instead. Mary told me her story when she happened to drop by the Buddhist activity centre in Georgetown during one of her arts exhibition held in the city.

A few weeks after Mary and her family moved into her new house in Philadelphia, she started to hear strange footstep sounds pacing on corridor upstairs at night and especially when she was alone. She could somehow tell from the footstep sound that the person must be of some weight in case you had to ask that if those footsteps by any chances might be produced by one of her family members.

One night when Mary was left alone in the house, after taking a bath; she walked out of her bathroom naked and she suddenly caught a glimpse of a naked white male walking back and forth on the corridor. The white male, as recalled by Mary later was somehow translucent but with clearly defined outline and quite materialised too.

Panicked, Mary quickly retracted back into the bathroom and locked herself in. She just couldn’t put 1+1 together as why was that a weird looking naked white male suddenly appeared in her thought to be empty house. So, Mary squatted herself in a corner of the bathroom very quietly and she dared not even took a large breath of air then. It was only after she heard the sound of someone was opening the front door accompanied with her hubby’s calling: “Honey, I’m home” that she quickly put on her clothing and rushed out to her hubby.

Though May didn’t tell her hubby and kids of the apparition she saw as she didn’t want to caused them to be alarmed. After all, it might just be her own vivid painter’s imagination behind the work. But her hubby John was soon found out the hard way too…

A week later, Mary was scheduled to have an art exhibition tour in Taiwan. So, off she went leaving John and the kids behind.

One night, John returned from his work quite late and the kids already fast asleep in bed. As he walked towards his master bedroom, he heard some intimate voices came from the bedroom. Feeling strange and curious, he paused in front of the bedroom door and attached his ear to the door to listen carefully. Yes indeed, it was the sound of people making love alright.

Felling insulted and angered as he thought Mary was having an affair, he immediately kicked opened the door and… there he saw in the bed, a white male was making love with another white lady whom John has not known of. At this point, the white male turned his face and looked at John and then he seemed to veer his eyes as if hinting John to ‘enjoy together’.

John was panicked but before he could put 1+1 together too, a tiny voice came from his back: “Dad, what are you doing?”

Apparently, the commotion of kicking the room door has awakened one of the kids. John turned his head to console the kid. But as soon as he looked at the bed again, there was nothing there!

From there on until Mary returned, John dared not sleep in the bedroom alone. According to John, he continued to hear the voice of people making love while he was sleeping in the living room. At times, there would be an eerie voice calling: “Come on man, let’s enjoy together!”

Of course, John dared not answer the call…

A Pair Of White Socks (一双白袜)

Cindy works as a freelance fashion designer and she travels frequently on assignment. Once she got a contract with a fashion house in Macau and she had to travel quite frequently between Singapore and Macau. So, the fashion house rented a service apartment for Cindy to stay there while she had to come to Macau.

One day when Cindy returned to her service apartment in Macau, she found a pair of white socks in her bed. Cindy didn’t know who owned the socks but she was quite sure that those socks were not hers for sure. Perhaps the cleaning lady has left them inadvertently. So Cindy picked up the socks and threw them into the dustbin and forgot about them.

The next day after returning from work, Cindy found the pair of white socks in her bed again. Again, Cindy thought the cleaning lady has picked them out from the dustbin and put them in her bed. So, Cindy paid no particular attention to the white socks as she sat in her bed working on her laptop computer. She just had to finalise a few sets of new designer clothing for some potential buyers from China.

As with other ladies, Cindy had the habit of chewing titbits in her bed while working. So, she kept quite a stock of titbits of different kinds to satisfy her taste buds.  As Cindy was reviewing her designs, she started to chew up pack of titbits after pack until her bed was filled with debris of various titbits. After she was satisfied with her designer clothing and her titbits, Cindy was looking for some cloth to sweep the titbit debris off her bed and those pair of white socks suddenly became very handy.

So said, as a matter of convenience; Cindy took up the socks and started to sweep the debris and then disposed of the socks into her dustbin. Feeling satisfied, Cindy closed her laptop and jumped into her bed and sleep.

Somewhere around 3am, Cindy woke up at night by the splashing sound of water in her bathroom. It was as if someone was taking a shower. Feeling odd, Cindy went to the bathroom and found the shower sprinkler was turned on but there was no one there. She immediately turned off the sprinkler and returned to her bed. After a few minutes, there was a knocking on Cindy’s door. Cindy jumped out from her bed and when she opened the door, she found no one there! Feeling a little creepy now, Cindy returned to her bed and vowed not to get out from her bed again for the night.

Just as Cindy was about to pull her blanket over her bed, she pulled out a pair of white socks instead. Feeling extremely frightened now, Cindy grabbed the white socks and threw them into the dustbin again. As soon as the pair of white socks fell into the dustbin, they immediately rose up as if being lifted by some invisible force. The socks then moved in the air until they were above Cindy’s face. At the same time, a disembodied voice was heard: “And, what do think you are doing with my socks?”

At this point, Cindy wasn’t too sure if she was too frightened that caused her body to be frozen solid, or she was held by some invisible force that prevented she from moving. As Cindy was about to pass out, the figure of a young lady wearing the pair of white socks appeared before her. Then the phantom lady uttered: “catwalk.”

Since Cindy was an experience fashion designer, she immediately understood the ghostly lady’s intention: perhaps the lady in white socks wanted to be on catwalk. So, Cindy said to the ghostly lady: “I will put your socks on catwalk during my fashion show if you just leave me alone!”

Almost as soon as Cindy said those words, the ghostly lady disappeared and in turn; the pair of white socks fell in front of Cindy’s face.

Cindy told me that she wanted to help the phantom lady to satisfy her wish to perform catwalk more than the fear of ghost itself somehow. So, Cindy asked a model to put on the pair of white socks and walk the catwalk. Since then, the phantom lady didn’t appear anymore and surprisingly, the combination of Cindy’s new white shirt red skirt cum white socks fashion became the best seller of the year.

No one knows who the phantom lady was but she was probably one of the best phantom fashion designers out there for sure!