VERY Hungry Ghosts!

   Yum!  Yum!  What's this?  It's the ingredients for chicken soup, already in the pot.  Is it our dinner for tonight?  Nope!  It's for the Chinese gods, who are very, very hungry during this seventh month of the lunar calendar.  They come down to earth and have to be placated with tons of food, nightly entertainment, and fervent prayers.  Oh, and lots of incense burning, as well.  On our "Hungry Ghosts Tour" last week, we were taken to a small family workshop where effigies of the king of the hungry gods are made--really, really BIG ones!  These are special-ordered by the various Chinese community associations and can cost thousands of dollars.  They're delivered in pieces and then erected in huge garage-like structures made of blue sheets (tarpaulins) arrayed along the already-narrow streets.  

    Then the local folks come to burn incense, pray and make food offerings, all designed to make the "hungry gods" happy so they won't bother us human beings.  I was quite amazed at the amount of food that's donated by members of the local Chinese community.


      I don't know how many hungry gods there are, but it seems that they all have to be fed.   Is there a blue bowlful of food for each?  What happens if one is forgotten?  I shudder to think! 

   Some of the gods must have a taste for alcohol, with Guinness being the beverage of choice.  They don't even have to pour their own!  'Course all this food and drink is covered with a dusting of ash from the incense that's burned so close to it, but perhaps the gods don't mind. . . . .

     What I'd really like to know is this:  Does all this donated food actually get eaten by anybody?  I think not.  I was told that the food on home altars actually does, once the gods have partaken. If there's anything left after the hungry gods eat, the family members can and do eat it up.  But, after a whole day out in the baking hot sun, I can't imagine that anyone except dogs would be interested in eating a basketful of chickens.  And there aren't very many dogs roaming around Malaysia because in Islam, dogs (and pigs) are considered filthy critters.


   Between the expensive paper effigies and the plethora of food and drink, the gods appear to have a pretty enjoyable life when they're down here on earth for their summer vacation.  But human beings surely seem to have to work hard to make that happen.


    The next blog post will tell about how those Chinese gods are entertained at night.