Do I say Hi

Or do I say good bye?

The day finally arrived.

In the silent night, the cold air breezes through the windows.

And morning hasn't waken up...

Whenever it comes to the 7^th month ("Hungry Ghost Festival"), I wonder time-to-time did all the dearly departed came back to visit us.  Grandpa certainly did blessed dad with a small winning fortune from the 4D, cos' a recent car accident had made my dad compensated a significant amount of money despite it wasn't his fault.  The winning number came from my grandpa's death certification.  Although the money could only covered half the cost, but it was certainly comforting for us as though we were being looked out for by grandpa.

27^th August, the 15^th of the 7^th month on the Chinese lunar calendar, marked an important day to pray for the departed.  Right till today, I still couldn't figure out the differences in the different types of paper offerings being sold.  Each time I asked mum, she would be very impatient with my questions and I couldn't remember well from asking the shop owners.  I was pretty tempted to buy some of these paper offerings home one day, not to burn but to keep.  I'm pretty interested in the drawings and textures on them.  In these paper offerings, I see our colorful culture and the kind thoughts for the dearly departed we missed.

As usual, mum made the paper offering purchases while I looked around the shop looking at the rich variety.  Bright Hill Temple was crowded with people today.  The wind carried bits of the burnt offering ashes flying out from the huge ‘burner' furnace.  The first stop would be asking for direction where the ‘tablet' was with the number they arranged and written on the receipt.  Walking up the slope, we walked upstairs and passed tables and tables of neatly arranged tablets with the vegetarian food offerings and flowers.  Finally we reached the air-con hall & left the shoes at the door and tried to look for the number.  Despite the number signs indicating what number till what number, we finally saw it with a helper.  The number was really small.  Dad and I took instruction from mum and she was a bit disorganized at first.  We squatted down with the big red plastic bag of paper offerings with our pens in hands.  She was a bit flustered what should be done and how.  We helped to write the recipients name on the paper offerings, carefully divided.  Afraid of writing the names in Chinese characters wrongly, I tried to borrow her receipt to see with all the info on it to her impatience.  I told myself, better to be prepared next time.  Maybe I deserve a head knock against the wall for being unsure how to write ‘ancestor' in Chinese.  But I certainly had my fair share of practice today.  Then I miscalculated one's share and wanted to make amendment on it but mum told me it shouldn't be done.  She was in dismay and I tried to calm her down by taking out that piece of written offering paper from the stack, and rewrote on a fresh piece.  Due to the amount of writing, we ended up sitting on the red carpet floor.  There were some inconsiderate people walking around without removing their shoes. 

Prayer of low chanting echoed in the background.  I looked at the yellow paper pasted on the wall that symbolized the physical tablet with all the names written on it to be prayed for.  Everything felt kind of alien to me suddenly.  It did cross my mind before whether these offerings could be received or of any use to the dearly departed.  I imagined the underworld and how these offerings could be used.  I was examining one of the offerings with all the necessities printed on it; clothes, shoes, TV, etc.  Dad also looked at it and told me just one word "Provisions".  What remained were still the precious thoughts behind these actions by the living.  After passing the bag of offerings to the helpers who helped to toss them into the huge burning furnace, we left.  A string of vehicles continued to flow in the two lanes road while we walked out.  A group of monks walked past us in their orange robes...  Sun was setting down... Bright Hill Temple looked very different today.  There was an extra sense of nostalgia in the air... 

"If I do not want what you want, please try not to tell me that my want is wrong.

Or if I believe other than you, at least pause before you correct my view.

Or if my emotion is less than yours, or more, given the same circumstances, try not to ask me to feel more strongly or weakly.

... I do not, for the moment at least, ask you to understand me.  That will come only when you are willing to give up changing me into a copy of you.

... If you will allow me any of my wants, or emotions or beliefs, or actions, then you open yourself, so that some day these ways of mine might not seem so wrong, and might finally appear to you as right - for me.  To put up with me is the first step to understanding me.  Not that you embrace my ways as right for you, but you are no longer irritated or disappointed with me for my seeming waywardness.  And in understanding me you might come to prize my differences from you, and, far from seeking to change me, preserve and even nurture those differences!" 

- David Keirsey & Marilyn Bates, Please Understand Me (Der Mar, CA: Prometheus Nemesis Books, 1978), page 1