It's official.
Doors will open tomorrow, Aug 4, I announced.
Sex bunny friend Stanley's eyes lit up. Any doors that open is a great window of opportunity for him to seize, grab, and fondle.
"Are we talking about the opening of a new gay club?" Stanley asks hopefully, making beatboxing noises.
"Or is it a new gym?" Carl the dense one, who's also a gym rabbit, chimes in, bouncing his python-sized biceps to Stanley's beat.
No, and no, I said, topping their wine glasses with more Pinot Grigio. The boys were at my home this evening where we had Thai food takeaway followed by Netflix.
"The Gates of Hell will open," I said with a dramatic hiss.
Carl urgently wiped off the half-chewed grilled pork pieces that landed on his face.
Stanley started flailing his arms and shaking his head, letting out a shrill scream that sounded like a 5-year-old girl who's being dragged by her feet by something under the bed.
Carl, his face still not completely clean from my grilled pork spew, joined in the fun and let out a series of high-pitched falsetto laughter reserved for Muslim cemeteries.
"I've always wished my home were filled with laughter, and dear God, I should have been more specific," I deadpanned, staring at my two friends, one of whom acting like a complete Pondan while the other channelling Pontianak.
The topic of Hungry Ghost is a big deal in the Lee family. At least when we were young.
Mrs Lee would often take the annual opportunity to instill unnecessary fear in her children.
We were told creepy tales of sorts. Every year, those tales grew scarier and scarier until we reached puberty and realised how ridiculous they were.
Still, some of my siblings -- actually, only our second sis S-- grew up fearing all things ghostly.
My first memory of the Hungry Ghost Month was when I was around 3. My sis would have been 6 and Barry, 1. Oldest sis was 10 and was thus more sensible than us kiddos.
It felt like a week-long party of sorts.
Back then, we lived along a row of shophouses. Granny and some of our aunties and uncles lived a few doors down from our home.
By evening, after dinner, the adult women would gather at Granny's front porch doing what seemed like an art-and-craft project: Folding colourful pieces of origami and chatting away.
I was easily amused by them. One of my aunts would stack a neat pile of those colourful papers and with deft dexterity, twist it with her fingers, and just like magic, the pile of papers would fan out evenly.
In the following days, Granny's home would be filled with gigantic bags of paper boats made up of all sorts of colour: Purple, orange, and white-and-gold. Those towering bags made me feel like it was Christmas. I imagined this is how Santa Claus' home looked like.
I soon found out the bags contained gifts meant not for children nor human. And the boats were actually supposed to be ingots, meant to bribe or enrich members of the Afterlife.
"Do not kick the bags. Do not cross over them -- or you will be sick!" Mrs Lee said to us with a mix of motherly love and threat.
I had no idea what Mrs Lee was so concerned about, but if children were taught to fear, we feared. So every year, I would tread carefully around those big bags of boats wondering to myself just how mysteriously dangerous they were.
As we grew older, we were allowed to see what happened to those Santa Claus bags as I had known them to be.
They were to be burned.
Our mum would let us tag along to the street opposite our house. All our neighbours would be there too, doing exactly the same thing: Laying out food and snacks and candles. It felt like an evening outdoor party and my siblings and I would run around with our cousins and neighbours' kids like we were celebrating something joyous.
Leave it to Mrs Lee the Grinch to take that joy out of us.
"Shh! Keep it down. The ghosts are eating," she said to us, pointing to the paper plates of food lining the streets.
Elder sis, who understood more things than Barry and I, started to tear in fear.
Barry began to cry too, realising that the food weren't actually meant for him to eat.
When we were old enough to go to school, Mrs Lee would warn us to hurry back before sunset because by nightfall, the ghosts would wander around and eat children.
"This mum of yours. Is she like a step mum?" Stanley had to check, amused by Mrs Lee's twisted way of bringing up her children.
"Is that why you turned out so damaged, Adam?"
Carl unleashed his ghastly laughter on cue, no doubt, giving the entire Pasir Panjang goosebumps.
Of course, as we grew up, we realised just how silly those scary tales were.
Barry and I soon grew out of this but not Mrs Lee's secondborn.
When we were kids, sis would never want to sleep alone in the dark.
She would close her eyes whenever we gathered in the living room to watch one of those Hong Kong films about bouncing zombies, on weekend nights.
She would bother to make big detours just to avoid Hungry Ghost offerings, or even wakes. And we're talking about the present.
Stanley shook his head pitifully on hearing this.
Carl took a deep breath like he was about to laugh again, and sneezed.
Sometimes, I would say to our Sister that it's ok to have ghosts around us.
"Shh! Don't say this out loud. They can hear you!"
Sometimes, my sis, who has a love-hate relationship with our mum, opens her mouth and Mrs Lee would come out.
Sis has grown up to be extremely fearful of ghosts and eventually a firm believer of superstition.
Her beautiful River Valley home is an example of her beliefs.
The first thing you feel about her home is that it's a showroom -- nicely decorated, furniture and accessories curated with precision.
In one corner is some jade qilin (mystical Chinese creature) that's supposed to ward off evil. Then there are crystal pieces in another area the house (I can't remember what they're meant for). And a big bowl filled with copper coins on some other antique-looking table. Even plants and paintings are strategically placed to enhance her career, wealth, well-being.
I was told she paid a handsome amount to her Fengshui master.
Barry and I on the other hand, are the complete opposites.
We no longer fear Hungry Ghost month.
Barry only fears being hungry.
We are both perfectly okay to walk through wakes at void decks. Perfectly okay to watch funeral processions if they happen to pass by us. And we love watching horror shows.
As we grew older, Sis would have to tap on our bravery especially in one of her old jobs where she had to fly around the region, staying in sometimes "creepy" hotels as she would say.
This would lead her to either face-time us or send us messages in the siblings group chat at night, where we had to distract her with ridiculous things.
This is how my sis had grown to love Stanley whose life story is meant to entertain.
But this Hungry Ghost Month got me thinking recently.
As adults, we are free to redesign our lives and change the narratives told to us as kids.
Being the ever-logical one, I would always that, yes, there may be ghosts or aliens among us. Just because we don't see them doesn't mean that they don't exist.
But just because they exist on our plane doesn't mean they will always want to harm us.
Humans can be scarier than ghosts, I would argue.
Elder sis would hear none of it.
Stanley cut in.
Whenever I walk in dark alleys, I keep hoping something happens to me and I hope that the someone would know Stanley is a big -- and I mean big -- brave boy.
Carl let out his fiendish laughter for the third time that night.
Adam's stories are based on real life events and inspired by real people
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