Kampong Pantai

We were up early to paint the second gate before the weather became too hot. All went according to plan except that there’s a black metal fence between Jan’s house and her neighbours house, this could also do with a coat of paint. The neighbour has a black metal fence between them and their other neighbour, if we do the fence adjoining Jan’s house, should we do the neighbour’s other fence to create balance? And so on ...

Today is a festival day for one of the Buddhist Gods at the temple Jan attends. Bill, Bun’s dad, is also at the temple, in spirit if not in body, so today we visited him.

The spirits are housed in a room that is overseen by the god of health and well-being. Along the walls are “tokens” with the name of the deceased people. Some tokens are prepared in advance before anyone has died but the spot in the room is reserved. Others are prepared as couples (or more) and a red tape is placed over the names of those who have not yet died. These tokens frequently include photos of the deceased. Food is left for the spirits, it must be vegetarian - Bill was not a vegetarian!Read more