Aisa’s Piano (爱莎的钢琴)

There is a now abandoned hotel in Shizuoka Prefecture (静冈县), Japan where the famous Mount Fuji is situated, the hotel was the house of a haunted old piano. Since the hotel was abandoned for more than 30 years and this story was told to me many years later by a pianist who happened to have visited the hotel during its operations; I have no idea if the piano or hotel still exist today.

Janet was a pianist who happened to know the hotel owner, Yamamoto and she did visit the gentleman during her piano performances in Japan. During Janet’s visit, Yamamoto invited her to stay in his hotel for as long as she wished free-of-charge. Janet was certainly delighted. So after completing her performances around Japan, she made it a point to have a short stay in Yamamoto’s hotel. Since the hotel is situated near Mount Fuji, Janet could spend her sweet time to visit areas around Mount Fuji. According to Janet, she disliked the hectic schedules of ordinary tour agency and Yamamoto’s kind offer came in just in time.

Finally, Janet found herself set her foot in Yamamoto’s hotel and she was warmly greeted by Mr. Yamamoto. After the dinner, Yamamoto excused himself due to his other business matters but he assigned his niece to attend to Janet’s needs. Before Yamamoto left, he suddenly said to Janet: “You can treat my hotel as if your own house but pardon me, whatever you do; please don’t play the piano you saw in the main hall… it belonged to my late wife, Aisa. I know you might be tempted to try…”

Janet gave Yamamoto her scout’s honour and Yamamoto left through the front door.

Days in Japan get dark very fast during winter. There was nothing Janet could do except to watch TV and chat with Yamamoto’s niece and due to curiosity, Janet enquired about the old piano. The young girl said:

“My aunty Aisa was also a pianist and the piano was Yamamoto’s present to her. She loved the piano so much that she never allowed anyone to play the piano without her permission. However, she committed suicide many years ago after uncle Yamamoto had an affair with a prat-time pianist. Hotel attendants found aunt Aisa leaned over the piano keyboard lifeless with an empty sleeping pill bottle… Apparently she had an overdose of sleeping pills and she wanted to play her last tune before she dies…”

Having said that, Yamamoto’s niece excused herself leaving Janet and a few attendants in a large hotel. Since Janet has nothing to do and no one was watching her; Janet thought she just try to play some tunes with the piano… well, no one would know and what harm could be done with some harmless tunes? After all, Janet was not a believer of supernatural stuffs. So Janet put her thought into action and she went to the piano and tried some of her favourite tunes.

After playing the first tune, Janet paused for a while to quench her thirst. At this time, she heard a series of footstep noise descending the hotel staircase. Janet thought it was just another hotel guest but she couldn’t see anyone came down from the staircase though.

Janet continued to play a few more tunes and suddenly her sight was fixed on the window curtain in front of her… the curtain moved without any apparent wind… No one would open the door or switch on a fan in winter time at night.

Just as Janet’s wandered about with her hands on the keyboard, the piano top cover suddenly slammed down with a loud bang which made Janet transfixed with shock on the piano stool.

Before Janet was herself again, she smelt the scent of lady’s perfume and a soft whisper near her ear: “Pardon me…”

As recalled by Janet later, she said perhaps the strange incident would not have happened if she just asked for permission first.

Granny’s Mysterious MIA Search (奶奶的妙法)

My friend, Chong went missing after his Bukit Hijau herb hunting trip last week. He went into the forest with a group of 5 people and a guide.

The guide only found Chong dropped off the trail when he was taking the headcount half way to the peak of the hill.

At first people thought Chong was releasing himself at the back of a bush but after waiting for some time; Chong was still not in sight. So the group decided to descend down to foothill just in case Chong was already down there. To their disappointment, Chong was not seen at the foot of Bukit Hijau. Before the guide decided to contact the authority for a search and rescue mission, one of the group member saw that there was a small shrine opposite the car park.

The group lead, Lee thought it is no harm just to go into the shrine to ask for a divination as to Chong’s whereabouts. No one wanted to follow Lee, so he went alone.

As soon as Lee set his feet into the shrine, a granny was in the shrine sweeping the floor. The granny saw Lee and asked him of his intention.

After Lee told the granny of the missing of his team member, Chong; the granny asked Lee to handle her Chong’s clothing and she would pray to the Datuk spirit of the shrine to help. Luckily, Chong has left his jacket in Lee’s car and Lee hurriedly fetch the jacket and passed to the granny. As soon as the granny got hold of Chong’s jacket, she started to kneel down in front of her altar and start chanting for quite a lengthy of time. She at times nodded her head and at times she shook her head; but the granny’s eyes remained shut during her prayer. Finally, granny opened her eyes and asked Lee to give her two coins. Lee complied to her request and the granny said: “Follow me!”

Out of curiosity, Lee asked his team members to wait at their cars just in case Chong returned; and he himself followed the granny to hike up the Bukit Hijau trail.

Though the granny looked aged, she could hike pretty fast while Lee could only follow at her back. Interestingly, whenever the granny reached a trail junction, she would put down Chong’s jacket on one of the trails and flipped the coins. She only picked the trail that was ‘chosen’ by the coins, i.e. the coins must show a head and a tail. So the granny repeated the process every time they came to a junction until they came to a place blocked by a tree broken half.

According to the granny, the place with tree broken into half is the dwelling place of the mountain god. Again, the granny started to kneel down in front of the broken tree and prayed earnestly just the way she did in the shrine.

Finally, the granny opened her eyes and told Lee that the mountain god has kept Lee behind the fallen tree as a punishment. Though a little disbelieved, Lee went to the back of the fallen tree and there he heard the moaning voice of Chong came from below a slope.

Looked like Chong has accidentally slipped and fall during the hike. Since the incident happened so fast and the jungle trail was slippery, there wasn’t time for Chong to shout for help. Whatever case that might be, everyone was glad that Chong was finally ‘lost and found’ though in quite a mysterious way just as how he got lost.

Until today Chong still doesn’t know how he has offended the mountain god. Since the granny didn’t say; and he didn’t ask either.

Sick Tree & Feng Shui (病树与风水)

I have said this before and I am going to say this again:

“Please pay particular attention to the condition of plants especially trees around your house for your own good…”

Perhaps what annoyed Westerners more is that Chinese likes to cut down trees around their houses. This is true due to Feng Shui reasons especially when a sick tree is around.

Basically a sick tree and a dead tree can bring very bad consequences to dwellers of a house.

If a sick tree is dying and in the process of decaying with sap oozing from tree trunk or root; then people in the house will suffer from sore related sicknesses. The location and size of the sores will depend on the location where tree sap came out from the tree. Whoever would be affected would depends on the location of the tree with reference to the house. If the sick tree is not removed in due time, then the sick will definitely die of blood related illnesses. As to when the ill effects of sick tree will attack will also depends on the zodiac animal and the arrival of flying star.

Dead tree on the other hand, will bring bad luck to due to dead chi which is bad for health and business…

Of course, all the talk mean nothing without a real life example.

Just fairly recently I received a call from Mr. Ho. His problem is that first it was his 65-year-old father suffered from unknown bad sore at his left leg, after a while; his mother too suffered from sore related issues at her legs… then Mr. Ho’s youngest sister also suffered from sore at her leg… A series of incidents made Mr. Ho think that the incidents are Feng Shui related.

After hearing Mr. Ho’s complaint, I knew that the series of issues were caused by sick tree and the location is at the northeast direction.

I told Mr. Ho my conclusion. Indeed, he agreed that his father’s house is indeed facing northeast direction, further just a few weeks ago; a mango tree was being chopped down due to termites leaving one foot of tree root protruding above the ground. As expected, tree sap still flew out from the tree root. Incidentally speaking, tree root represents a man’s legs. No wonder whoever stayed in the house suffered from sores at legs!

The remedy is simple too, the reminder exposed tree root must be excavated clean and the sore problems shall be cured with medication.

So, it is good to plant trees but remember to remove them when they are dead or sick. Please remember too to uproot the tree completely to avoid any side effects for your own good.

Fated (命中注定)

According to the arts of astrology, we cannot change what is fated to us.

Many scientific minded people would say astrology is superstitious and unfounded.

Many people yelled out: “My fate is in my hands!”

And many, many more…

To me, when it is fated; there is no escape. There is only misinterpretation of an astrology reading, unless one’s date and time of birth are wrong of course.

There is a Chinese saying:

“命里有时终须有，命里无时莫强求。”

“What is fated shall be given, there is no need to be persistent.”

This certainly sounds pessimistic, but I assure you that there is some truth in it:

My friend, Kenny spent many efforts to find his soulmate according to the principle of astrology.

One day, he hurried to my place and shown me the date of birth of a lady said to be his soulmate. It was a lady born in 1990 who matched all that are described to be rich and beautiful. Since Kenny did spend quite some time in the study of astrology so I just skimmed through Kenny’s calculation and indeed, his soulmate seemed to possess ‘heavenly ethics’ and quite well to do too…

I did tell Kenny that he is not fated to have decent soulmate before but he wanted to prove me wrong. Maybe this time, Kenny wanted to show off in front of me and made me apologize to him.  So, I gave him a big bow and not forgetting to congratulate Kenny on his ‘rare finding’.

As expected, soon the news of Kenny’s approaching marriage came to me. Just before I gave Kenny a call, he called me instead…

“What would it be if my soulmate’s year of birth is in 1991? I just looked at her identity card and she is born in 1990 and not 1991?” Kenny asked eagerly.

I answered lazily while checking on the calculation…

“Well, if the year of birth is indeed in 1990, your soulmate would be your pain-in-the-ass! Hahaha…”

Kenny: “What can I do now?”

“Pray… or get a divorce to lose 50% of your property or lose your life… Hahaha…”

Kenny: “…”

As expected, Kenny did marry the lady and only to learn that the lady is the sister of a local mafia group… And indeed, his wife is Kenny’s biggest pain-in-the-ass now!

Gui Lou Vs Ghost (鬼佬与鬼)

Cantonese like to call a foreigner ‘gui lou’ or ‘ghost man’ since foreigners come to Guangdong Province now and back in history. Since we have read that Asians probably can’t cope with western ghosts very well, can a ‘gui lou’ tackle Asian ghosts instead? I am sure that would be an interesting thought. Anyway, just hold on to this thought and let me continue and tell me your opinion at the end of the story:

I used to have a habit to linger in Petaling Street, Kuala Lumpur while I was staying in Subang Jaya. So happened that my pal has a budget hotel in Petaling Street, so I would just spend a night at his hotel when it was too late to take a bus back. Of course I didn’t need a room to spend a night but just a couch or armchair would be sufficient.

The hotel receptionist counter was situated under a staircase and my pal was kind enough to put an armchair there for me to rest. So while I was sleeping in the background, the receptionist would be sitting in front of the counter overseeing hotel guests and visitors from entering and leaving.

One night as I was lying in the chair, a Chinese couple came to the front desk to rent a room and the receptionist gave them Room 3-11; and the couple checked in happily.

About half past one in the morning, the Chinese couple rushed to the front desk scantily cladded to complaint that there were ‘something’ running in their room. According to the couple, while they were soundly asleep, they heard footsteps of people running around their bed. The man switched on the desk light but found nothing was wrong so they continued to sleep. About half an hour later, the couple felt that their blanket was yanked by some external force. Both of the came out from their bed to investigate. And again, they found nothing… So they demanded to switch room.

On hearing the complaint, the receptionist, Mr. Ooi nodded his head and call the porter to assist the agitated couple to move to another room.

I thought the incident was over so I continued to sleep while Mr. Ooi doze off over the desk.

Not long after that, a British couple came to the front desk to look for a room. The good old Mr. Ooi gave them Room 3-11 and the couple left the front desk and headed towards Room 3-11…

After the British couple was out of sight, Mr. Ooi turned his head and whispered to me:

“Let’s see if the ‘gui lou’ have any problems!”

Out of curiosity, I asked Mr. Ooi: “What about Room 3-11?”

“Oh, someone committed suicide in the room last year and it is haunted!” Said Mr. Ooi.

I couldn’t really sleep that night, so after the British couple checked in; I started to chat with Mr. Ooi.

It was 5am and I felt thirsty and thought of going down the street to get some drinks. So I asked Mr. Ooi if I could bring him anything…

Just before I could open my mouth, the British couple rushed to the front desk and complaint about ‘someone jogging upstairs’ throughout the night… They want Mr. Ooi to ask ‘whoever upstairs’ stop exercising…

After some assurance, the British couple went back to the room.

At this point, Mr. Ooi turned his head towards me and said: “Looks like even gui lou cannot communicate with gui (ghost)… Hahaha…”

When East Meets West (东方人遇西方鬼)

Now days people in the east can migrate to the west and likewise. This has caused many cultural shock problems physically and also spiritually.

I have a Hong Kong college mate, Jane who has migrated to Vancouver, Canada some 10 years ago. Just recently she dropped me a mail after visiting my MagicSEA blog to share her true ghost encounter:

Jane has bought a double story house near seaside just outskirt of Vancouver city. Many Hong Kong Chinese like to migrate to Canada and USA because they can buy big houses with affordable prices.

So Jane got her dream house with a car garage at the side. This is her dream house that Jane would otherwise couldn’t afford to buy in Hong Kong.

All went well for the first month after Jane settled in the house. After a while, she found something peculiar about her dream house…

At first Jane could some footstep noise as if someone was strolling to and fro in front of her bedroom. She sworn that she was not dreaming because her bedroom is on the second floor and the floor was constructed by wooden planks. If anyone would walk on the wooden corridor at night, then the cracking noise of planks under certain weight obviously could not be mistaken.

At the beginning it was just the footstep noise outside the corridor, but gradually someone or ‘something’ started to knock on Jane’s bedroom door… to be exact, something was actually start knocking on each of the room door in the house; not just Jane’s alone.

Jane thought that the 5 room house was indeed too big for her, so she asked her mother to fly over to accompany her.

Just as before, the first few weeks after the arrival of her mother, the strange knocking and footsteps stopped. But before Jane could celebrate, the knocking incidents occurred again…

Only now the haunting seemed to intensify. At night, Jane could now feel a presence in her bedroom after the knocking on her door. It is always the footsteps, the door knocking and then a foul odour that resembles stinky salted fish or sweaty socks. Slowly Jane said that she feels a presence moving around her bed until one night, she felt a cold breeze blew into her bed and she was frozen solid. Jane struggled but she could only roll her eyeballs. Gradually Jane fell into slumber after some struggle and only to wake up in the morning.

Such incident has become a routine until Jane said that she just ignored the presence in the house. Though Jane kept her secret, her mom found there were something wrong with her daughter and she finally managed to invite a Taoist from Hong Kong to perform exorcism.

An exorcism ritual was carried out by the Taoist, but after some communications, the Taoist said that he couldn’t exorcise the spirit in the house because it was the previous owner of the house. According to some unwritten law, whoever comes first; is the owner of the house. So the Taoist could only chase the spirit out to the garage and let it stay put in the garage.

Unfortunately speaking, Jane’s peaceful days only lasted for one month as the spirit returned to the house again.

A second Taoist was summoned and again the spirit was bound in the garage… and again, the spirit broke the boundary after a month later…

I supposed by now Jane has grown accustomed to the spirit in the house. So I advised her to just let the spirit as it is for now until she really cannot stand it anymore. For I am sure Jane would move back to Hong Kong some point in time…

The Secret Fan (特别的粉丝)

To the outside world, an entertainer would like to have as many fans as possible. But there are some fans that no entertainers would like to have; this is especially true for those fans with extreme compulsive behaviours. These fans would do anything just to show the entertainer/star belongs to them even up to the stage of die-die together using whatever means possible… Now, there is another kind of fans from ‘the other side’ that could give the entertainer as much headache as their worldly counterpart…

Ben is a well-known local movie star and he had his fair share of experience with a bizarre fan. Ben’s experience is best told in his own words:

“Naturally that I too have my fair shares of local fan groups but never had I known that ‘people’ from the other side do enjoy my movies as well…

A few years ago, I received a letter from a young girl expressing her interest on me. Since it is my custom to reply to any letters written to me when I have the time, so I replied to her letter. Perhaps it was not so wise to do so because as soon as I responded to the first letter, the girl sent the second, the third and so forth… Since the content of the letters was no other than that she wanted to be with me; I gradually got agitated. Not that I have not met this girl, I don’t really know her at all… after all; I was busy with my movie shootings at that time.

Since there is a return address at the back of the girl’s letter, and that the girl just stayed outskirt of KL; I decided to pay the girl a visit and to ask her not to write any more letter. So I found an empty time slot that I could just drop by the girl’s house one afternoon and indeed I was at the girl’s front door after an hour’s drive from my company.

After I pressed onto the door bell, an old lady opened the door. She looked bewildered and she asked: “Who are you looking for?”

“Oh aunty, is Mei in? I am Ban, “I replied.

The old lady looked at me queerly and said: “Are you joking, Ben?”

Since the old lady looked quite serious, I thought I just explain further: “No, aunty. Mei wrote to me many times. Today I happened to be around so I just drop in to say ‘hi’…”

After finished my words, I handled a pile of letters to the old lady to show that I mean business.

The old lady held the letters in her hands and started to inspect them one by one carefully. After flipping over the letters for quite a while, she raised her head and said to me:

“Oh, forgive me Ben. Mei is my daughter and it is indeed her handwriting… but she passed away a year ago. She was certainly a diehard fan of you. I put your photo in her coffin myself…”

On hearing the old lady’s words, I felt as if something has smacked my nape and a sense of chillness came up from my spine but I manage to reason out perhaps it was someone playing pranks using Mei’s name. So I made an apology to the old lady and hastily excuse myself.

More strange things entailed on the following night…

I used to check on my Facebook page before going to bed just to catch up with my fans and friends alike. And against all odds, there was a message from a person called ‘Mei’ and she wrote:

“Why did you disturb my mother this afternoon?”

At this point, I still think that someone is playing a joke, so I wrote back:

“Who are you? Mei is dead…”

And the reply came: “This is Mei and do you know how much trouble I got just to send you letters and messages? I know you slept with your girl last night after you both ordered some pizza…”

 I almost fainted! I didn’t tell anyone about what I did last night…

Then Mei sent me another message: “Don’t worry… I am leaving. See you soon…”

There were no messages from Mei since the last one but… My girl got pregnant and we hastily arranged a marriage.

The night before my wife went into labour, she told me that she had a dream. In the dream, a girl said she was Mei…

So you see, Mr. Liew. This is the reason I ended in your house at this odd hour. What should I do with the baby?”