Today I suddenly had a thought. Raised in a traditional ethnic chinese family and a second (or third) generation Malaysian chinese, from a very young age my siblings and I were largely exposed to the 'traditions' and norms of being a chinese. From the normal stuff like its bad luck to walk under a ladder, never cross the path of a black cat or bad fortune will befall you to the extreme ones like a dead person will return to its dwelling place in 7 days after its death, we have grown up to believing that these things are actually our reality of life and if we do not conform in a certain way, then we are somewhat not normal.
As I grew older, things like chinese fortune telling and feng shui started to fascinate me, I tried my best to learn up the most I could in this area and found it more and more interesting. The one thing that really bothered me was, some of my family members who believed in a certain religion, had tried to impart upon me that it wasn't being a true believer (of that certain religion) if for example, we observe a certain chinese tradition or refrain to do something for a certain reason.
We Malaysians call this 'Pantang' which translates to the word taboo. Its pantang for example, to whistle at night, cos if we do so, we would attract snakes. Or its pantang to look at a funeral wake or procession if you do not know the deceased. Some of these pantang which us chinese observe sometimes can't be logically or scientifically explained and dissected but yet we observe it nonetheless to avoid misfortune upon ourselves.
One of the pantang which I clearly remember as a kid was that, during the hungry ghost festival when people are burning hell bank notes to appease spirits of the deceased, try, if you can, not to step on the spot where these hell bank notes are burnt for fear that the spirits will come and hunt you down for stepping on their new found stash of wealth.
Do not look into a mirror which has just been broken as your spirit will be divided into several different pieces and it would take 7 lifetimes to be put together. Another 1 which I remember clearly was, when you sit down, its pantang to shake your leg or you will be shaking away all the luck which you may have on you.
The night before chinese new year, as a kid I remember rushing off to the bathroom to wash my hair a few hours before midnight because if you wash it during chinese new year, you will be washing away all your 'ong' or luck. The same goes for sweeping the floor during chinese new year.
There's another one about doing something bad and your new born child will be born without his or her backside.
What do you think about pantang and taboos? Do you have any to share? Email me at davegeh@gmail.com and maybe we can discuss about it.
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