Size down childhood fears

 

Continuing my "down the memory lane" trip in KL which I described in my last blog, I have to narrate my visit to the Chan She Shu Yuen Clan Ancestral Hall. It was a trip I need to take to address my childhood fears when passing by this temple. About fifty more years ago before modification works, the statue of 2 young doormen guard the front of the temple. They appeared really spooky in the eyes of a small child dressed in 'eerie" garbs, quite like those paper servants which the taoist burn for the dead. This was especially so at night. My heart would beat faster and I would try to avoid looking at the temple when the taxi I was in passed by it in the evening. Perhaps it was after hearing rumours about a rickshaw driver dropping 2 young men at the temple and later discovered that the dollar notes were actually hell money. 

Well I thought it was time for my adult self to see what these guards really look like. To my delight the very temple that I dreaded is now a tourist attraction and is actually an ancestral home cum temple for a Chinese clan with many famous ancestors. To my disappointment however there ain't any scary statues guarding the front of the temple. Also the shocking green façade which I once found gaudy is now replaced with a greyish green front.  I couldn't have imagined things could I? 

Indeed the temple holds loads of history and artwork almost like a boutique museum. Symbolically this once deemed spooky eerie temple is to my adult self a remarkable historical treasure. As if to size down my childhood fears, 2 paper man servants (about 18 inch tall) stand on each side of the altar in the inner hall of the temple.

I still dare not look at them intently but I know their function is to serve.

Memories

 

My dreams (ie. those I remember) often have my old KL home as the background. Even if the dream is very literal, meaning a mere presentation of situation or feelings that occur at day time, the stage of the dream is almost certainly that of my old KL home.

Last week the nostalgia and the good street food beckoned and I found myself wandering the streets of KL visiting the streets where my old home, my father's shop and my alma mater were located.

Various thoughts and fantasy swirled in my mind. In no particular order here are some of them:

- If I had a huge windfall (ie. become a tycoon) I would buy up the whole row of flats, one of which I once lived. I would turn this urban slum into a nice residential estate. Actually I would have to be a well connected billionaire to buy up the whole street for the whole neighbourhood has become a touristy food street. Alternatively, in a fit of madness I can just rent or buy the flat where I used to live and renovate it extensively to be the home which I longed for as a child. It would be like a retro KL flat in the 60s where a middle income happy family once stayed. You see my old home was never like that. It was really like a home factory where the tailors worked and it was never a happy family because my parents fought constantly. So if I have too much money to spare I would rectify the chaos in my childhood and restore the peace and introduce some semblance of a happy home which I longed for half a century ago.

-My old alma mater is BBGS (Bukit Bintang Girls' School). It was situated where the upmarket shopping centre Pavilion now stands. I checked the google map. I paced the Pavilion. I tried to figure which part of Pavilion exactly was where my classroom was, the classroom during my last year in the school before moving to Singapore. "This must be where the classroom was, this shop must be where the tuckshop was where we ran fastest to reach at the sound of the bell for recess". "Where would the primary school be?" My mind was filled with such preoccupation when passing through Pavilion which was just across the hotel I stayed. During morning breakfast at the hotel, a plate of steamed chickpeas was displayed at the salad corner. I took a few spoonfuls of it on a plate, stared at it and travelled across the years back to the Indian kachang putih man with 6 fingers and his makeshift stall just outside the school. I loved his steamed chickpeas! Bless this guy for he lightened up many of our days.

"And if even only one good memory remains with us in our hearts, that alone may serve some day for our salvation.”  -Dostoevsky in Brothers Karamazov