I lived next to a Chinese cemetery
The quiet, peace and serenity of living next to “dead neighbours” is way better than living next to noisy highways, condominiums and shopping centres.
I felt compelled to share my story after reading an article in FMT about some 300 Malay residents of five villages demonstrating against a Chinese cemetery project in Kampung Bukit Cerakah.
I am a Muslim who grew up next to a Chinese cemetery. Back in the early 80s when my father decided to move out from his family home and purchase a place of our own, properties in Penang Island were too expensive. So, he branched out to the mainland and finally bought his dream home in Machang Bubok, a small village lodged between Bukit Mertajam and Kulim.
Our house was big enough for the five of us with extra land all around – just nice for dad to start his orchard and mom to tend to her garden. Since the house was located quite deep inside the village, it was hidden from the main road’s noise and traffic. Besides the peace and serenity, we also enjoyed having wild animals dropping by for quick visits – from the regular wild birds and squirrels to the occasional monitor lizards. Living close to nature made our home even more pleasant.
However one thing we did not take to, was the Chinese cemetery next to our house – literally twenty steps away from our main gate. When we surveyed the house a few times before purchasing it, we did find it a little creepy having to live next to a graveyard but we didn’t think much of it as everything seemed rather peaceful around the area. And there was nowhere else we could purchase a house that big for the price offered – we pretty much guessed it was the cemetery that kept the selling price low.
It was only after we moved in did we begin noticing the “activities” around the cemetery. I remember my brothers and I hurriedly cycling out of the house every time we heard “death music” – I mean, the music accompanying the dead into the cemetery. We watched funeral vehicles displaying pictures of the dead slowly drive through the cemetery, followed by buses carrying family members. Mind you, in a Chinese-majority village inhabited by mostly old people, funerals took place at least once a week.
And that was not all. There was also a huge Chinese temple less than 500m away from our home. Every time a Chinese festival like Cheng Beng came around or any gathering for the Chinese community in the neighbourhood, the only road into the village was practically gridlocked thanks to the rows of stalls displaying roasted pigs and slaughtered ducks hanging on wired rods besides the rows of metre-tall incense rods set-up along the road. Let’s not forget the huge public stage built for the Chinese Opera for night performances.
Sometimes when we drove back home past midnight after visiting our grandparents on the island, we’d catch a glimpse of the opera actors on stage. Funny thing was, there was no audience. I asked my dad once why they performed if no one was watching – that was when I learned that the opera performances were for the dead. It could have been a full house for all we knew, but as part of the living, we were unable to see “them” with our naked eyes. I remembered having trouble sleeping those nights.
But it was not only the Chinese cemetery I had to deal with growing up in my village – there was also a “tokong keramat” (shrine) in our backyard, right behind our durian trees. When dad bought the property, he knew there was a small hut underneath a huge old tree behind our house, hidden somewhere among the massive roots. However, as time passed, we realised the hut got bigger and bigger, and soon began attracting visitors.
On some nights, Chinese folks visited the keramat with fruits and pau offerings to request for lottery numbers while Indians slaughtered chickens and poured the blood around the area before calling for the spirit residing in the tree to help them.
When sounds of chanting emanated from the keramat, we’d all peek through our kitchen window to witness the odd “dancing” sessions in progress – it used to really creep us out, especially when those attending the keramat told us it was the “saint” living inside the tree who was making “his” visitors dance by possessing their bodies.
Scared stiff, we reported the matter to the local authorities. However, despite a number of officers having visited our backyard, we realised their responses were always more or less the same: “Hal kepercayaan mereka, baik jangan kacau, nanti ada masalah (We better not interfere in matters of their faith, there may be trouble)”.
Being a staunch Muslim, my mom and dad made sure my brothers and I stayed away from the Chinese cemetery and keramat, fearing the worse. However, being adventurous kids, without our parent’s knowledge, we often hiked across the cemetery and up the hill where the sunset was amazing; cycled around the cemetery on some bird-watching expedition we conjured up; and snuck behind our backyard playing Holmes and Watson, attempting to solve the mystery of the dancing spirit.
Over the years, my brothers and I grew up and moved out from our parents’ house – however mom and dad stayed put. The house, the neighbours, the cemetery and the keramat was home to them. With our village now developed with tarred roads, new surrounding tamans, new drainage systems, morning markets, a public library, playgrounds and schools, new neighbours began moving in (including quite a number of Muslim families) – but the cemetery and the keramat continued to stand strong.
Today, many of our friends and families who raised an eyebrow upon learning of our “dead neighbours”, are waking up to see new highway projects, condominiums, shopping centres and shop lots sprout up around their neighbourhoods. Despite their constitutional rights to have a say in new projects mushrooming around their neighbourhood, they continue to have their peaceful sleep snatched away in the name of development – and I’m pretty sure they have now come to realise just how lucky we were to live next to the dead.
Indeed, we were lucky to live next to a cemetery where we got to enjoy peace and serenity, well most of the time anyway.
Fa Abdul is an FMT columnist.
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