TBNT S06E16 | Looking After the Ashes with Kopi Soh - Two Book Nerds Talking

Episode Transcript
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(00:14):
Hello, friends and book lovers,Welcome to tool book Nets Stocking with myself,
Hania Ahman and my partner in pagesat Crime, Diana Yong. That's
a new one. That's a goodone. Just thought about that this morning.
We are super excited today because weare joined by the one and only
copy So. Yea all the wayfrom where are you coming in from California?

(00:40):
Yes? So, copy So haswritten a very very interesting book which
is based on Buranakhan superstitions and culture. So it's called Looking After the Ashes.
And I'm pretty sure you've seen thisfloating around everywhere in bookstores and Malaysia.
Guys, So, how are youdoing, copy I'm doing great today,

(01:02):
like like you know, like you'allguys know, and was nervous yesterday.
I couldn't sleep, was like youknow, and everyone keeps telling me
just be yourself. Oh my god, what am I? Yeah? I
saw like your friends and fans wereall going like a tilla. Yeah,

(01:23):
your readership sound lovely because like I'ma huge fan of the supernatural, I'm
a huge fan of Matana Rangg andI found your book was such a treasure
trope of my own childhood memories andslight traumas inflicted on bi relatives. So

(01:44):
so this book feels a little bitmemoir, a little bit recording, like
your family kind of shenanigans. There'scautionary tales in it, even a bistiary
to a certain extent, you know, because you have a plethora of ghosts
and spooks and gins, you know. So can you just give us a
bit of background how this book cameto be. Well, I started journaling

(02:07):
when I went abroad. So Iwas really lonely being in the middle of
the prairies of Alberta, Canada.I mean, I had never left home
before. I've never even been toSingapore, let alone you know, half
across the world. So I wasthere and then I was lonely. I

(02:28):
was homesick. I was thinking ofmy family back home, you know,
crying a whole lot. And duringthose days, you know how the aerogram
takes like a month to reach youknow, my dad's letters would take a
month to reach me, and myletters would take a month to reach him.
And phone calls were super expensive,so we never got to call each

(02:49):
other a lot. So we don'tget to, you know, go back
and forth like what we do rightnow. With you know, video WhatsApp
videos and stuff like that that's free. We had to pay for everything.
So because I missed them a lot, I started writing down stories in my
journal, so recalling back, youknow, oh, the story of my
dad, my mom, how theymet, and little childhood stuff like that.

(03:13):
Flights going back to Malaysia were prettyexpensive. I felt like maybe I
couldn't have thought to go back asoften. I don't know what flights are
right now. You know, wecan go back almost every year, so
I could probably go back like onceevery five years. So not wanting to
forget my life back in Malaysia becauseit's beginning to feel like very very far

(03:38):
away. That's why I journaled itup. So it started a long time
ago. How do you end upin a belta? If I can ask
this question, that sounds like astory in itself, Yeah, that's a
story in itself. Like probably anotherday I'll tell you dad, like not
now. Okay. So I didintroduce the book very slightly at the beginning,

(04:01):
But would you like to maybe putit into your own words, how
you would describe this book and whatit's about. I think it's about family.
For me, it was about familybut then family, for in my
case, involves a lot of superstitionsand taboos and ghosts and spirits and all

(04:23):
that. So, uh, ita lot of people due to the book
cover. And I've been told bythese people, including my different publishers that
approached, that it could give peoplethe wrong message that it was a store
a book full of ghost stories.But it's actually not. So the book

(04:45):
is actually like a what do youcall as in a pirana kandish. It
might be a chap childie mixed ormore like yeah, you know, mixed
planal vegetables, or more like maybeyou know who can trybod which is like
you know that summer dish that youyou know every after you have everything else
and you just throw it together.So I think that's how we describe my

(05:09):
book. It's a little bit ofhere and there of everything that I just
put together, just memories, sono no real rhyme or reason to it.
Actually, I'm not sure if I'vebeen describing it correctly or if you're
making it sound attractive to readers.It's like, hey, coming to my

(05:30):
schizophrenic mine. Everyone, it isa wonderful book, pretty cute. It
almost feels like there's it's there's someessays in it, there's a lot of
musings, there's a lot of memories. I mean, I mean it's written
with a lot of love as well, which why I kind of felt that
you were you were not necessarily goingto be flattering to everybody. Yeah,

(05:56):
but it's kind of written. Imean, it's it's you know, it's
written quite honestly, I felt.But it was also written with a lot
of love, which is kind oflike, you know, like you can
imagine how it is like growing upin this boisterous family where everybody had an
opinion on everything, and everybody hadideas on how to get rid of handtoos,
which we will get into in abit. But why do you think
that Malaysians one thing but Parana can'tspecifically, Why are they so into their

(06:21):
taboos and superstition. Is it away of holding on to their past?
To me, I've always thought thatit was a way to tv up the
household responsibilities and you know kind oflike get people to do things without a

(06:42):
whole lot of convincing. So withtaboos and all that stuff, you know,
it's kind of like, okay,because Parana can household as we all
know with the TV series like TheLittle Nonia, you can see it's huge.
You know, you have your bigbrother, you have your little brother
with the wife and the kids,the housekeepers, the nannies, each kid

(07:02):
family of their own with nannies andcooks and helpers of the cook and personal
mates of the main track and soon. So if you want someone to
not do something, it's so mucheasier to say, don't do that,
otherwise you'll be cursed, rather thanexplaining to length like, for instance,

(07:23):
you know if you have one ofyour helpers in the kitchen start singing while
she's preparing food, and you knowthat when one is distracted while cooking,
accidents may happen. So instead ofjust explaining to her you know why it's
dangerous to sing in the kitchen,you just tell you know what, if
you're sing, you're going to marryan old man, or you're going to

(07:44):
remain a spenster. So that's amore effective way of silencing her and making
her concentrate on her work. Soand then other taboos are used to like
control your kids. There have somany kids around that's like your grandkids.
That fews everybody in one household.So for kids, instead of telling them,
you can tell them, well,you know what, do not stay

(08:07):
out after late evening because ghost isgoing to come get you. It's easier
than telling them do not go outbecause and then explaining your whole like of
the dangers of kids being out atnight. You just tell them ghosts are
coming. You know, ghost isgoing to catch you. You know,
if you don't come home by thistime, you're gonna be get caught by
they have to get there, andthen that said, dude, you die.

(08:35):
When I was growing up, myyounger sister, Sweeling and I were
not allowed to go out onto theplayground during sunset because that was when the
ghost people came out to play.Most of these spirits, we were told,
were benign. They were just likeus models. They ate, drank,
slept, and played. I don'tthink they ever went to the bathroom,

(09:00):
though I don't recall my aunt sayinganything about ghosts needing to go.
There were, however, three kindsof ghosts that we had been warned about.
I believe that almost all Malaysian kidshad been told stories about them at
some point in their lives while theywere growing up. The first ghost is
the Hantu Deti ghosts with pendulous breastswho lives in big storm drains and wanders

(09:26):
around during nighttime. She kidnaps childrenplaying outside their homes at night. If
she catches you, she would forceyou to drink milk from one of her
breasts. One side would be sweetmilk and the other salty. If you
chose the wrong one, she wouldnever let you go. Of course,

(09:46):
the adults conveniently neglected to tell uswhich side was the right side. That
is why, according to my aunts, we were not allowed to play outside
after dark or near storm drains.So I'm not sure that there's like a
deep meaning to all these taboos andsuperstitions rather than a way to control,

(10:09):
you know, to make you know, to make a household more manageable in
the shortest easiest way possible, youknow, keeping everybody in life. Yeah,
can you realize, like, finishyour food, you know, finish
your rise, or you'll get problemon your face, rather than telling you
like, you know, telling thekids some kids in Africa are starving,

(10:31):
Like who cares? Right, butyou care if your face has a whole,
you know, like have pimples,right, even as a kid,
you don't want to have pimples onyour face. So I think it's very
effective. Actually I don't know,I think the very in effectiveness. Like
I my version that I heard wasthat if you don't finish all the rise
on your bowl, you know yourfuture husband is futures a lot of true,

(10:54):
right, yes, yes, andI couldn't care less, but okay,
okay, just just you know,to follow on from what you were
talking about with the superstitions and everything, how how well do you think they
translate into modern life and do youdo you follow? Do you continue that
tradition with your own children? No, Actually, certain things we do,

(11:18):
like for example, respectful elders,we do that, like you know,
praying to your ancestors. You know, when you get a chance, you
would do that. Like even thoughwe don't have like my dad he was
cremated, so we don't really havelike an ancestral tape or anything, but

(11:39):
whenever his birthday comes around or thingslike that Father's Day, we would you
know, light a candle, thinkabout him, talk about him. So
it's more you use it to rememberrather than actually doing the practice. And
then for like Chinese New Year,my son he would kneel down and serve
me tea as a sign of respect. Oh. The other thing that he

(12:01):
does practice is that before you eatfood, like eating a table full of
elders, you would call, youknow, like you know, bagota,
degota, you know, something likethat. So he does that, and
he does that. He will saylook, you know, like mom tia
before he eats something. So thatis as far as I would take the

(12:22):
tradition, as far as tradition wise, as far as taboos and superstition.
One thing is important to me isthat when we go hiking, like whether
it's a national forest or in anywherein the forest, in nature, I
believe that you know nature, thespirits there and everything you know, the

(12:46):
rock, the trees, the grass, everything you need to respect nature.
So I would teach him, like, you know, before we go in
start any hikes, to ask permissionto say, you know, I'm here
just to hike. If I doanything wrong, which forgive me if I
need to key, or as apermission before I start squatting down. So

(13:09):
things like that, I think westill do I do, you know,
try to impart that onto him,the respect of nature. And one more
is I think that's kind of alittle bit silly, is that before I
enter any rooms in the hotel,I would kind of knock first. And
he's seen me knocking, and hewould ask me, why would you knock

(13:30):
before you enter the room? Youknow there's no one there. But I
said, well, you know,you never know, there could be some
spirits there in the hotel room.And then just not as a polite way
to say, hey, I'm here, don't disturb me. I'm just coming
to stay for like two nights orsomething like that. So that's one thing
that you know, I tell himabout it. I'm not sure he follows

(13:50):
that, but the nature stuff Ithink he did. He does. He
does respect nature in a way.You know, when you go into anywhere,
you don't destroy nature, you don'tstuck on it, you don't pluck
any trees. I think that's that'show I bring it forth to today's Well,
I still wash my feet before Igo to sleep, and that's sort

(14:11):
of like a childhood habit. Andespecially if you come home late at night,
which I do a lot, it'slike to make sure you don't bring
anything with you you don't have don'thave bad dreams, right because so yeah,
so even when it was in thedepths of winter, I used to
still wash my feet and I wasin the UK. So I think,
I think all of us, especiallybecause we grow up in the same culture,

(14:33):
in a sense, we all carrythings like that and it's just second
nature. You don't think about it. Yeah, that's true, that's true.
Yeah, yeah, I mean definitelythe permission in the forest, because
I hike a lot as well.Yeah, wherever you are, you know,
it doesn't have to be just inMalaysia, right and anywhere. It's
still respect nature. That's just whatyou do. So okay, let's talk

(14:56):
a little bit about hand tools,because I was quite fascinated when I read
about the nail in the hair andthe fact that, of course anybody who's
going out with a ponti mythology knowsthat if you nail the neck of a
pontier, she will become a loyalwife, which I always thought that's such
a bad end of the stick forI know, do you know what I
mean? It's like, that ishow weird you are safe by making you

(15:18):
into a loyal wife. I'm alsolike, how how do you stop up?
This is a literal ghost, alittle a literal like scary thing,
like a disgusting thing, right,and then you want to turn her into
a wife, like I couldn't evenknow you get that, I could get
Yeah, I wanted to be amother of my children. Yeah, I

(15:39):
know, yeah, I was quiteright exactly. I just don't get it.
But that's the thing, right,is it? Because the nail is
is iron? You know, becauseif you talk about even Western mythology,
that's iron, right, that sortof like protects you from fairies. Yes,

(16:00):
yes, I think so. SoI find it quite fascinating that horror
to a lot of extent has acommon mother. I mean, do you
do you have any knowledge If youdid you read about other mythologies or other
things and found that the similarities.I'm just wondering, where did this nail
thing come from? I don't know, Like now that you mentioned it,

(16:22):
you know, I was like,you know, remember Rashe Maleficent, where
she you know, when she approachedthe humans and they threw iron at her
and she was weakened by it?Right, I never even thought about that
that iron was like a general toolto to to tain these creatures. But
no, I've never no, Imean really I've never really thought about it

(16:45):
further than that. I just thought, okay, you know, this is
something that I could use as aprotection for myself. I never did think
further as to what that. Therewas similarities in other fairy tales as well.
I think I read somewhere that it'sit's something to do with the purity
of metal, and it kind ofis like a counter to magic. Okay,

(17:07):
but I always found it very fascinating. Right, where does all this
come from, this belief? IfI may, I think it's it comes
about because of metal. Uh,is something that is man made, like
in terms of like metal is somethingthat human beings have to refine and work

(17:29):
with, and that is a humancreation. So it counters the natural spiritual
world, which is very I guesssilver wolves, right, because metal specifically
it's a military thing. It's moremeant for like like it's made into sorts
and stuff that you don't use goldto make swords, so it's it's something

(17:51):
that is like it's it's yes,it's a bastion of human power kind of
thing. So that's why it countersfairies and stuff like that. Yeah,
yeah, that could that could bethe reason. Like, yeah, since
Malaysia is a multicultural country, wehave to be aware not only of Chinese

(18:14):
ghosts, but also ghosts of otherraces. One such ghost was the infamous
Pontiana, a Malay ghost. Itis believed that the Pontiana is a woman
who died during childbirth and has returnedas a vengeful spirit. Thet is known
to turn up after the delivery ofa baby to try and steal the newborn

(18:34):
away because she hates to see otherwomen have what she couldn't. It is
believed that during the daytime, herspirit resides in the banana tree. You
can also smell her when she isclose by, for she gives off a
nice floral scent similar to that ofthe plumeria flower, often followed by a
stench of a decomposing body. Theonly way you could kill the Pontiana was

(19:00):
by ramming a nil into the napeof a neck. These spirits were just
a few of the threats from whichmy family dutifully protected my mother. It's
a fascinating thing to have to seehow we had these leaps of you know,
like we take one thing that wesee and we change things to like

(19:21):
because we saw this happen, therefore, it must follow that something else is
true, like like you still talka lot about these kinds of things,
right, like why we have Likeyou know that all the banta laram around
pregnancy to begin with, like pregnancyand childbirth, and you can you can
understand that people were very, veryfearful of the whole process. People feared

(19:44):
women not being fertile, people fearedwomen having too many daughters, people who
heared women giving birth to a darkchild, a dark child, don't say
it next, but yeah, Imean that's the kind of thing, right.
People we were so worried about aboutthese things that they couldn't control,
that they thought of all these waysof controlling it. But nowadays, I

(20:07):
think we've pretty much moved away froma lot of these older beliefs. You
know, a lot of them Igrew up with as well. I'm not
parandakan. I think they're pretty muchyou know, all elders would use any
ammunition that they have to scare yourkids anywhere. So what do you think

(20:29):
we are losing by not having thisclose contact to the natural and spiritual world
that we had back then. There'sa lot of mysticism about it. So
do you think we've lost that?And do you think there's anything that there's
door of drawbacks to our being morescientific and more logical and our thinking nowadays.

(20:49):
Oh well, I think to beginwith like I said earlier, it's
a tool to control. And somaybe we found better expert nations for the
things that we could not explain before, you know, so that we no
longer need them. In a sense, it depends on each individual. I

(21:12):
guess, like how how much youwant to use it in your life,
Like if you could explain something awayscientifically, then you probably would, like
you know, or why don't youcut your nails at night? You know,
not because it goes to come getyou, but because during those times
there was no electricity, using likea candle and cutting your nail, you

(21:37):
know, you might just cut offa tol so, but now you have
lights, so you have electricity,so you know, why should I not
cut my nails? Right? Somaybe there's stuff like that. It's not
the evolution and technology and if weno longer need them, why still hold
on to them? And we onlyhold on to stuff like maybe that serves

(22:00):
us like probably you know how thethirty after you give birth, the mom
can come up and do anything forlike thirty days, you know, the
more good kind of during that time. I think it's still a good thing,
you know, to hold on tobecause the mother needs ress and she
needs to take care of the baby. So to say that she can come

(22:22):
up for thirty days, it's actuallya good thing. Maybe like a lot
of women really don't mind like keepingthat particular part of it, you know.
It's just like, yeah, Igot thirty days, you know,
leave maternal leaf. Just make fulluse of it. I don't have to
talk rad to do anything else.And there's yeah, nann need to take
care of my kid at the sametime I can recuperate. So you still

(22:45):
hold onto that thirty day thing,although there's really no scientific well it needs
to be thirty days, right,So yeah, I think we only keep
the things that we want, andI don't see it as a loss,
but rather maybe just you know,just moving differently in a different direction.
Do you have I mean that we'regoing back into panta larang, right,

(23:08):
do you have any pantan larg whenyou were tiny and you're small and you
thought was so ridiculous, but youdid it anyway. I mean, can
you tell our listeners a few ofthe ridiculous. Oh and a weird belief
system, you know, like becauseI mean I have those, but your
your book had so many of them, But what what were your favorite kind

(23:30):
of like cautionary do not do thisor else? Okay, one of it
is said, do not point atthe moon. That's something I really still
don't do to today because every timeI pointed it, somehow other might ews
would get cut. And I haveno reason, no explanation, nothing,

(23:53):
but I thought it was ridiculous,Like why I shouldn't be pointed the moon.
There's nothing wrong with the moon.There's no scientific explanation that the moon
would come down and cut your ear. But I still want because occasionally when
I point, I still do getcut. Go figure, I don't know
why. Oh interesting, I meanI think when I grew up, you're

(24:17):
not supposed to point at a rainbowas well. Oh yeah, because like
maybe your your hand gets cut offor something, or you have but maybe
they just don't want children to pointat stuff? Is it? Is it
rude? Maybe because it's right?Yeah? Yeah, you have anything,
Diana, Do you have anything thatyou cannot point at? When you was

(24:41):
well? The moon? Definitely themoon was is what I think that's that's
one that I told my kids about. I don't know if they've ever tested
it out. I still I stillam aware of that every time I see
the moon. Yes, I'm nota rebel by nature, so you know,
you never really felt the need tolike test it out. I mean,
let's be safe, right, justbe safe other than sorry, especially

(25:06):
when you're talking about like the confinementpractices that really chafed me what I had
to go through them, because youknow, like I had to go through
it with my mother in law,who is very much traditional and so she
had very extreme rules. But thinkingabout it, like certain things like,
for example, the fact that youknow you weren't allowed to touch water for

(25:30):
right, Yeah, I mean notwashing your hair that is torture. Not
having wind on your face unless you'reall covered up, that is torture.
But not having to wash stuff,and therefore you cannot have to you cannot
do chores, all right. Idon't mind that. You take what you
can get. But at the sametime, sometimes when you're going through these

(25:52):
things, it really it really makesyou question why these things happen. But
it's also interesting to think about thethought processes of the ancestors, right,
what made them think this way?And what was it in their environments that
gave them these ideas? And Ithink that is an interesting thing to think

(26:12):
about, like, you know,like the way things have passed down through
culture, the stories we tell andyou do actually talk about, like you
know, the cultural stories that peopledo tell you. You're talking in the
book, you do mention the midAutumn Festival, traditional stories and all that,

(26:32):
and I think a lot of thatis actually we've lost where it came
from, right, Nobody actually knowswhat the actual real story was. And
same thing with the with the DumplingFestival as well. No one really knows
why we have dumplings during the DumplingFestival and why do we really have to
have moon cakes? You know.But it's just so interesting to think about

(26:57):
the way things have been passed outand we've kept what we've lost. I
can't recall exactly which dish he wasreaching out for, but our hands crossed
and he wounded me. Swilian.I was startled and quickly withdrew my hand.

(27:19):
How many times do I have totell you never allow your hands to
cross someone else's hand during mealtime?He looked really upset as he scolded me,
but held back from making a scene. Crossing hands during meal times was
frowned upon as this might cause aquarrel between the two people who crossed hands.

(27:41):
This rule was one that my fatherreligiously observed. I remember being yelled
at countless times for stretching my handsacross his to get to a dish.
In hindsight, I think my fatherwas more upset about the fact that my
hands were blocking his view of thefood he was about to take, thus
delaying its journey to his mouth,rather than actually believing in this taboo.

(28:06):
Plus, with my hands in away, he probably plus with my hands
in the way, he probably couldn'tsee what he was picking up. Anyway,
Regardless of what I thought, Istill obeyed the taboo and tried to
abide by it. Another one ofthe don'ts that I found especially difficult to

(28:26):
follow was the no changing seats duringmeal time rule, Suilian, How many
times do I have to tell youonce you have chosen a seat at the
dinner table, you are not allowedto change seats? My mom scolded me
as I was squirming uneasily. Ihad just asked my cousin Gabo to switch
seats with me. But why whycan't I change seats? I hate sitting

(28:51):
next to the toilet. Well,you should have thought of that before you
sat down. Please please let mechange this once, I begged my mother.
Instead of replying to me, shechose to change the subject by asking
if I wanted some fish. Nothanks, I replied curtly. Mame then
said she wanted some mar stood upto scoop some fish for her as one,

(29:17):
there is no more meat left onthis side of the fish. Take
bones off. Just take the bonesoff, and you can scoop the bottom
part of the fish for me.Mae, there is less bones there,
too, suggested my tow a core, indirectly reminding my mom to not flip
the whole fish. Gurkpo, whohad been silently stuffing her face, suddenly
decided to ask, why can't youjust flip the fish? Isn't it easier

(29:41):
than going through the trouble of pickingoff the bones. It was an innocent
question, a question I would haveasked if she had not. It made
sense to me too to just flipthe fish. The elders at the table
rolled their eyes at her question,and then looked at Gikow. Since she
was Girpo's mother, it was herresponsibility to educate her child. To turn

(30:04):
over a whole fish is considered badluck and also bad manners. Jako replied,
that's why we don't do it.It is considered similar to turning over
a fishing boat, and that couldbring misfortune to our family. When she
was done explaining, I decided totry my luck again at changing seats,
but once again my request was denied. No, if you do that,

(30:29):
it would mean that you would marrymultiple times, depending on a number of
times you switch seats. Do youwant that to happen? Ma, asked
me in a stern voice. Somehow, even at that young age, it
was drilled into me that marrying morethan once was not a desirable thing.
It meant that either my first husbandwould die and therefore I had to remarry,

(30:49):
or that my first husband would divorceme and even worse faith in the
eyes of society at the time,in which case it would make me an
outcast. Bearing that in mind,I stopped asking if I could change seats.
From then on, I would alwayssit in the same chair for every
meal until I was done eating.When you were writing this book. Did

(31:12):
it all come from your own personalexperiences or did you have to find out
a little bit more about the storiesbehind them before you could write it,
Because I mean a lot of thethings that I remember from my childhood,
they were like bits and pieces.I don't remember everything that I was told,
and I think that kids weren't toldthat much anyway. You know,

(31:32):
you're only told as much as youwere you needed to be told. So
do you think that there's something inthe way that the stories are passed down
that are specifically necessary for us tohear or are there things that we've lost
through the years. Do you thinkfor me when I wrote the book,
I think there's no way as achild, I could remember details or information.

(31:57):
Like you said, you know,you could see and something happening,
but you don't really know what itis. It's just like, Okay,
during the weddings or the night beforeor what they do or the rituals,
you're a kid and no freaking cluewhat you're doing. You just see that,
oh wow, this You know thatshe gets to have her hair combed,

(32:20):
and then she gets to eat thislittle nice round dumpling things you know,
and and you don't really know.So when I wrote, When I
started writing, I had to doresearch as well as to what was happening
and try to put piece them together. I saw this, but what was
actually happening when this happened? Soyeah, so I did do research on

(32:43):
it and then filled in the blankswhere my little goal mind couldn't make sense
of what what you know, whatwas happening. I mean, I think
we talked about this when we werewe were chatting online. Whether it's kind
of auto fiction, right, whichis this part out of it as autobiographical,
but then there's also some fictionalized accounts. And I was kind of fascinated

(33:06):
by the stories that you It seemedlike in your book, whenever somebody goes
against something, something bad happens tothem. Yes, like like retribution is
swift, you know, like yourcousin Charlie, and then you're and then
you'll pull later in the book,you know. So how liberal were you
with the truth? How much wasit through your kid's eyes? How much

(33:28):
of it was sort of like somesome sense of memory? And then did
you talk to your relatives? Imean, I guess this is just building
up on Diana's question, like howmuch is fiction? I don't know.
I just put it all together.It's not. I don't really know how
to answer your question, to behonest, because sometimes it's more like I

(33:51):
put bits and memory together and thenI changed them enough to not get this
owned by my family. So motivation, yeah, yeah, it is like,
you know, oh my god,you brought me this literally, you
know what, you make me noshot and stout and stuff like that,

(34:12):
and make me cruel and then youmake me kill that thing, you know.
Yeah, So so I try notto villainize too much anyone, but
at the same time keep them authenticto what they are looking at more the
good side of them. What isgood about this character? Yeah, they're

(34:38):
just like cousin Charlie. He maybe, you know, very mischievous and
naughty, but he has a goodheart kind of thing. So the process
of writing that and never, itnever went never. I don't know how
hard to say this. It's likeI didn't consciously think, oh, how
much is too or how much it'snot. It's just like how I put

(34:59):
this together her to make it sothat it's it's a story that I can
tell that it's as close to whatI experienced as a child. What was
What was your family's reaction to thebook. Strangely nothing. I mean like

(35:22):
seriously, my mom didn't saying shegot my book and I was you know,
I was away when the you know, the books arrived from Penguin.
She did the unboxing for me andopened and took the necessary videos, and

(35:43):
I heard that she read it allhad she didn't say anything. Okay,
that's scary. I never asked her. You know, my sisters, they
know they wrote me a review,but you didn't write me a review.

(36:05):
But you did just say like personally, they didn't come and see to tear,
you know, like you got thisthing, this thing and you know,
stuff like that. I didn't actuallyreally give me any feedback on the
book. So honestly, my familythat the same much. Maybe it's just
because you're like, like, youknow, like, what's what's just say,

(36:27):
this is what happened. We wereall there news to us. It's
like, you know, like youwere just telling it as it is,
so there's really not much you know. Yeah, yeah, you know that
like no one came and say hey, you know, like I said,
you know, you make me looklike really you know, basically no news
is actually good news in this inthe sense unless somebody comes and yelled at

(36:49):
you, you know that, yeahyou didn't. You didn't step on your
toe on any toes you did,didn't tell an outright lie according to their
memories. So yeah, and USis an auto fiction. Like I said,
well, no, that's not you. You you know, like,
did you think it was you knowit wasn't Yeah, I know, yeah,

(37:14):
you know, like the you knowchili you know podas the kind of
thing. It's like, oh,yeah, no you think it wasn't that.
I wasn't you. So I hadmy you know, my getaway thing.
At the very least, you wantto know that the people that you
you're describing in your books don't thinkof it as complete trash. So yeah

(37:37):
that ideally that would come and supportyou. But I guess you know,
tacit support is still support, right, Yes, that's right. It's a
typical Asian family, right, anythingneed to break, you know, then
you get to bed. Yes,beheaded says the same thing as well,

(37:59):
what is there to say? Youknow, every time you achieve something and
she's like oh okay, you knowshe doesn't even go and tell relatives,
you know, oh my no,my daughter did this. You should publish
a book and stuff like. Shedoesn't even do that. So it's just
like, you know, even whenwe graduate or stuff like that, she
just doesn't even tell people that,you know, wow, you know,
my daughter just graduate from somewhere,blah blah blah. She doesn't say that

(38:22):
she's Yeah. I think that's whatthe old ways that we that we probably
want to do away with. TheRight's that sense that you know, I
don't need to tell you how goodyou are, because you know, you
go to your head, you know, but some acknowledgment is always nice.
I know, I know, youknow, like say I'm proud of you.

(38:44):
But then parents at that era wouldever come out and tell you they
just I'm so proud of I mean, it's just impossible for them. I
think it's just there's just something holdingthem back even to say the words I
love you. I don't think theywould actually come on saying. Their skin
will crawl off. I know theyprobably think that kids today are probably over

(39:06):
praised. Yeah, that's true.That's true. Like like you go up
and receive a small diploma that youfinish kindergarten, and I don't understand that
this is too much, so it'salmost like it's overcompensated. On the other
side, all these praise staffed parentsnow have to really we need to do
a drawn that looks like crap,and you're like, oh, my goodness,

(39:29):
you know this is like some goodyeah, because because we never got
that when we were kids and belike, you know, it would have
been nice, right, So wedon't want our kids to suffer that.
Well, that's that's actually for me. I find that that's a balance because
for my son, if he scoresan A and something that he's really good

(39:52):
at, say like math, thenI would be like, oh, okay,
you know, it's good, yougot an A. But if you
it's causing a B for maybe sayart, and he's not good at drawing,
I would make a big deal ofit because it's something that he strives
to do and he can't draw well, but he keeps striving to do well

(40:15):
and the best he can do wasa bee. I would like freaking celebrate
his be So he does get praisedon that part. But if it's something
that is his strength and he doesn't, you know, and he gets well
saying okay, good, you know, yeah, you know, I know
that's your strength. So that's fine. So I guess there's a balance there
and not just like praise any oldthing that they do even if they don't

(40:38):
put an effort. But if thereis an effort put in to doing something,
I think it should be mentioned insome ways, you know, like
like in the book you focus moreon these cultural taboos and stuff like that
that I relieve saw it undercurrent oflike the control that you were talking about.

(41:01):
It also the way parents look afterthe kids. The way that we
parent nowadays, I often feel isa response to the way we ourselves were
parented. Hmm, that's right.What do you think your response is the
way you were parented? I meanwhat you're asking, is it like how

(41:23):
I was parented as opposed to howI parent right now? Yeah? Yeah,
yeah. When I was young,it was just like basically do as
you're told. There was no discussionallowed. There was no like you know,
oh you heard my feelings, youknow, stuff like that. No

(41:43):
feelings didn't come to play, likewhat if you said so you know,
like yeah, parents didn't really carehow you felt. It was more like,
you know, you do what youdo and coming into now, I
think parenting my own son, Ibelieve believe that I pay more attention to
feelings because I realized that some thingsthat our parents actually do cause some trauma,

(42:08):
you know, childhood, and weare currently dealing or rather I am
currently dealing with trauma childhood trauma aswell, which is like it translates into
how you relate to other people inyour relationships. So it pulls up like,
you know, how you see yourparents, how you see your parents

(42:29):
are their relationship, and how yourparent parents do all those things, you
know, it comes into play rightnow. You know. It's almost like
if you see your parent saying havingan argument every day and you resolve,
you know, never to argue withyour partner, and that doesn't work because

(42:51):
you need to have communication. It'sjust like, okay, I don't want
to quarrel with you, and thenthat's it. So a lot of the
stuff that what parents did to usbefore, it's somehow having minor traumas does
happen, you know, and notbeing listened to and stuff like that,
and so you try to do ita different way right now with your kid,

(43:12):
But then again you could be traumatizingthem as well. So I don't
know we'll yet to see only untilyou know they grow up. Then you
realize if you did it wrong orright. And I don't think that's really
wrong or right. We each justdo the best that we can with what
we have. For guess, yeah, I mean I only have four children,

(43:35):
so it's yeah, yeah, stillyeah, okay, okay, because
because Diana always likes to talk aboutthat kind of stuff, I like to
talk about ghosts and stuff. Soyou have indicated to me as much that
you occasionally see spirits, so Idon't know whether you see them a lot
or And then I was also readingabout the story of the Ghost Child,

(43:59):
about adopting a ghost child. Canyou tell I mean, can you share
I mean an instance where you realizethat you can see spirits and maybe the
story of the Ghost Child. Imean, I'm just I just found that
so fascinating. Yeah. Yeah,the child is something that was new to
me as well. And I thinkif you haven't read this book, you
know this is something that you're goingto have to find out in the book.

(44:21):
But yeah, it's really interesting.Okay, Well for me, I
guess about to address your seeing spiritsthing, I always feel that spirits are
just all around us, and whenI see them, I usually do not
feel like afraid or anything, becausethey're just entities around us, you know,

(44:43):
in another world. How I dealwith them. Sometimes the spirits are
are pasky. They just like toannoying you. So you know, one
very effective method is to get angryat them, to scold them, and
to just like, you know,if they annoy you. Like for example,
there are some that really really liketo rudely yell my name just as

(45:09):
I was falling asleep. And thevoice that they yell in is a voice
of someone in the household. Soimagine you're like falling asleep and studying something.
You're like, wow, go bey, and you're like waking up,
thinking somebody you know something's wrong.And so I got really fed up because
they shame out try to fall asleep. The voice would come, and so

(45:31):
I would just like yell at thatand say, you know enough, okay,
I need my sleep, so justjust get lost. Don't do that
to me again, And they usuallyleave you alone after you do that.
If you speak to other people whocan hear voices, they will tell you
the same thing. Get mad atthem and they will you know they were

(45:51):
probably leave you alone. So oneof the stories that I can share actually
happened the last trimester of my pregnancy. You know, one evening, I
think it was around like six orseven pm, you know, the hour
during sunset where we are told notto take a nap because sunset is a

(46:13):
time where demon's gabbls and you know, jeans come out from the hiding to
meddle with you and then whisper thingsin your ears. So anyway, I
was tossing and turning, half asleep, half away, and I saw the
shadow standing at the foot of mybed. I did not say anything,
but I sensed that it wanted mychild, so like, instead of being

(46:36):
scared, I got really fiercely mad. I was so upset, and you
know, I'm carrying this thing fornine months and now you want it no
way, you know, So Igot mad at it. In my mind
It's like, do not disturb meor my child. I remember thinking to
myself, I will fight you andI will protect my child, So just

(46:59):
go away, get lost. Andit disappeared, So I think, you
know, like telling you guys thestory to today, I don't know if
it was real or it was justa dream. Because I was in a
half you know, half away,half a sleep stake, and so bottom

(47:19):
line is that it, Yeah,it went away. So you also have
to keep them in line, then, yes, you do, just just
like just like a kid. Yeah, when it comes about it, you
know, when they come at bucking, whether it's for kids or whether it's
like kid kids, you know,it's just like you know, no,
no, we have to. LikeI've never heard that that you keep them
in line by being mad, becauseusually the default is you get you get

(47:44):
scared, right, so they arethe one in control. Yeah. Actually
I have a that kind of remindedme of this girl who could see spirits
when I was in boarding school andshe there was one time in her dormitory
she just sat up in bed andshe just shouted, shut up. And
it was a very quiet dormitory andbasically the spirits were really noisy. When

(48:08):
you said that, I completely rememberthis because we were all like what is
she doing and who is she shoutingat? You know, which is kind
of creepy in itself. But yeah, apparently that works. It works.
Yeah, didn't know that, right, Yeah, just yeah, but I
don't know if it works for likeall spirits because I don't have that kind

(48:30):
of experience, but the ones thatI do, I know that it works.
Just get angry at them and theywill just go away. They want
an easy target, don't they.They want somebody who's just going to be
like you know, they they're incharge, you know, they get to
to say what's happened next. Butif if you're going to show that you're
going to fight back, right,they probably don't want that fight. Yeah,

(48:51):
yeah, that's true. I mean, you know, like it's it's
more fun to get a risele ofyou and then it's just like, oh
my god, you're so scared.It's more fund so yeah, right right
right, Wow, Wow, Ijust like something. I think there's some
kind of protection there, you know, having that fierce energy around you.

(49:12):
Okay, this is mine, thisis mine, don't mess with me.
Okay. Wow. I mean,like I would not have been mad,
but I think, like, youknow that that's valuable information. I think,
you know, people people have neversaid this to me, people have
never mentioned this, so that issomething that you know definitely. But I

(49:36):
guess if you are a person who'ssensitive to this sort of thing, eventually
you will get fed up, youknow, you probably get You probably get
scared first a couple of times,but eventually you're like, hey, come
on la, you know I mean, I mean, I think it's also
kind of kind of like a naturalhuman reaction to being pestered by whatever person
or entity. Right, yeah,this ghost child. Okay, regarding this

(49:59):
ghost let me tell you something.Okay, it's just like, ah,
okay, I would prefer not totalk about it because it still scares me.
So yeah, it's something that I'vebeen afraid of and not really ready
to delft into it, I guess. But why do you think people adopt

(50:22):
a ghost child? I mean,on a very on just that level,
you know, Like I think thereare various reasons a lot of them adopt
the ghost child. It's more likefor I think prosperity. I think for
finances, Like they they help youwith your finances. That's what I've heard

(50:43):
mostly is for that. So somehowthey make you rich or they make Yeah
there's a way that you know,you take care of them, they're going
to take care of you. Yeah, that's basically what I think the purpose
of the ghost child is. Mygrandaunt had married a Thai national, and

(51:08):
that was why she lived in Thailand. I remember when I was about seven
years old, we went there fora visit. I did not like it
at all. I remember being scaredmost of the time. My aunt's house
was a wooden house on stilts andhad an atterck roof. It was dingy
and dark, smelt musty, andwas supposedly haunted, but my parents did

(51:30):
not care because, according to mydad, we had enough amulets with us
to fend off any evil spirits.Anyway back to our Thailand trip. Upon
entering the house, I felt uneasy, but I did not voice my feelings
because I did not want to expectanyway back to our Thailand trip. Upon

(51:54):
entering the house, I felt uneasy, but I did not voice my feelings
because I did not want to upsetthe family. Every room in the house
was dark, and there were strangealtars with figurines and objects everywhere. Come,
come, eat up. I haveprepared all your favorite ty food,
said my grandna to my mom,and she invited us to sit down for

(52:15):
dinner. I looked at the foodtentatively, as I did not like spicy
foods, and most of the dishesseemed to be loaded with just vegetables.
Eat, su Lan, your corpospent a whole day cooking for us,
my mother said, in a tonethat was laid with an unspoken warning for
me to just eat and not makea fuss. I picked up a piece

(52:37):
of what I thought was chicken andate in silence. My eyes wandered to
the corner of the room, wherethere was a small doll sitting on a
wooden store. Unable to contain mycuriosity, I asked my aunt, Corpo,
is that doll for me, thinkingperhaps she had bought it for me
as a present. My grandaunt was, I learned for a moment before looking

(53:00):
me straight in the eye and replied, in a serious tone, that is
not a doll. It is mychild. I looked at my mom as
I was unable to comprehend work forwomen by da mar just casually kept eating
her dinner and dishtop more chicken forme. Faster eat before your rice becomes

(53:22):
cold, was all she said.That night, before bedtime, my corpo
came in to tug me in andkiss me good night. She sat at
the edge of my bed and beganpatting my bag in a living manner.
Suilia Na, earlier, I didnot mean to reply to you so sternly.
It's just that those are not dogsfor children to play with. These

(53:44):
dolls have spirits in them, sheexplained patiently. Apparently, the doll in
my grandaunt's house, the one Ihad wanted to play with, had the
spirit of a ghost child that mygrandaunt had adopted. Little did I know
that that was also the reason whyour family was there. My parents somehow
got into their heads that in orderto help them with their relationship and financial

(54:07):
situation, they wanted to adopt aghost child. My corpo explained to me
that ghost children are usually the spiritsof unborn babies that had died inside your
mother's wombs. Normally, a priestor monk would dig out the body of
the dead mother. She paused fora second, picked up a sunflower seed,

(54:30):
bit on it to crack up onthe shell, and use her tongue
to flick the flesh into her mouth, cut out the unborn baby from her,
perform some rituals, and then bakedthe baby into a figurine or emulet
figure. I caught my breath andfell a chill run down my spine,
but made no comment. I wasjust a child till today, I can't

(54:52):
quite fathom why my corpo deem itappropriate to go into such gory details.
When she explained it to me.After her explanation about her newly adopted doll
child, I felt even worse.To begin with, I already disliked staying
at her house because it was alwaysso dark and there seemed to be shadows
looking everywhere. I stayed awake forhours that first night. The second night,

(55:19):
as I was preparing for bid,it felt ominous again. I can't
quite pinpoint what made me afraid toclose my eyes, but I must have
fallen asleep, because the next thingI knew, I felt sharp, painful
tugs. My hair was being pulled. When I looked up, I saw
little people, tiny dark figures,almost like fairies, except they had sharp,
white teeth that gleamed. It's adream, it's a dream. I

(55:45):
chanted and tried to take deep breadsto calm myself down. I tried to
sit up, but couldn't. Itried to call out and wake my parents,
but somehow I could not. Iopened my mouth and tried to scream,
but I was incapable of producing anysound. My voice remained soundlessly inside
my body. Nothing came out.Are you sure you want one in your

(56:07):
house? I overheard my grandaunt askingmy parents early the next morning, when
they thought I was still asleep.Both my mother and father nodded. My
ma explained, the reason we neededis because times are hard now. The
economy is not doing well. Ourbusiness is dwindling. People prefer to buy

(56:27):
from larger companies. Yes, financiallywe are not doing well. Some of
it is due to my gambling habit, my father admitted. His head bowed
law. He then continued, ina soft voice, this lack of finances
is also affecting our relationship. Weare constantly quarreling. Okay, if you

(56:47):
are sure. My grand aunt confirmedThe reason I am asking is because normally
it is not advisable for a familywho already has children to adopt a ghost
child. Sometimes the old child mightbecome jealous and harm the child. She
explained for them, I guess myparents must have been desperate because in spite

(57:07):
of the warning, they proceeded toadopt the ghost child. The one my
parents took home with us looked likea very very small child. I was
told that this was my younger brotherpit. It's very similar to the Malay
concept of simpanhantuya where you where youhave a hand to raya or where either

(57:31):
you keep a toyo you know,which is also a ghost child to a
certain extent, right, Yeah,for for for certain things. I mean
atoyo is to go and steal thingsfor you is for you to have to
be to be strong and have agood libido. So probably it's a very
similar concept, isn't it, Likeyou have this thing to help you in

(57:52):
certain things. But yeah, andI'm terrifying your entire family. I think
the only of you is right ifyou were keeper girls, it's like I
don't make you, make you superlike really beautiful, you know, like
you want to be gorgeous, andthen it goes to somehow, you know,
make other people see that you're gorgeousor make you rich souicide of beauty

(58:13):
or rage sure, you know.Yeah, I think there's there's two things.
I mean, I mean, that'sthat's one thing we have here called
pandumping that is actually for knowledge thatyou can actually entice somebody like a companion
and that kind of yeah, becauseI mean, I guess succer if you
talk about the malaysucker, right,it goes into very a lot of different
categories. But pandumping is one thingthat I just recently sort of know about

(58:37):
is that it's a companion that isthat stays with you, but it's also
for you to gain knowledge, likeyou know, like you want to see
that knowledge or knowledge of them theworld. Yeah. Yeah, and and
oftentimes you forget they exist until youknow it's time for you to pass them
down or whether you're going to die. So it's this happened in my own
family, by the way, andwe had no idea that this span dumping

(59:00):
was in existence. Yeah, soI always find it very I mean,
my family is a very logical family, but I mean, like we actually
have conversations about things like this,And I just the was one time I
was talking to my siblings. Iwent like, can we just acknowledge the
fact that we're talking about a supernaturalcompanion? Okay, let's move on.
How do we get rid of it? Do you know what I mean?

(59:20):
It's like it's just in your life. You don't yeah, yeah, you
don't even like yeah, sometimes youknow it's just there and then you don't
even think about it. And thenthat's why I said, like you're on
to talk about childhood, and thenyou can't even say I have a normal
childhood because it just involves all thesethings. So you know, like,
oh, yeah, the neighbor hadyou know, like a toyo, you

(59:42):
know, saying like, oh theneighborhood a dog kind of thing. Yeah,
this is yeah, it's just andyou never even like think twice,
okay, you know, since here'sa toyal better stay away, look that
stuff up. And then yeah,better make sure your toes are not exposed,
right because they were coming bite yourtone your toe looking for Yeah,
that's true. Yeah, so yeah, I was like what you were saying

(01:00:05):
before, honey. But the differencesin the way we think it is so
true because you you think of theghost child, and you think about all
the supernatural in our lives, andI think and I went to the adoption
part of your story, the themesabout adoption in your story, right,
like even adopted ghost, like allthose people that you adopted into the family,

(01:00:29):
and I and that was that's alwayssomething that fascinates me about. It's
not just a even a Chinese thingeven anymore. It's it's it's even even
a lot of Malays have done thislike they've adopted. Everyone seems to need
children in their lives. And thenwhat you were saying about your your your
your your uncle who had you know, been adopted basically to be a servant,

(01:00:51):
And it was fascinating to me becauseno one's ever actually said these quiet
things out loud. Yeah, it'svery relaxed in those days. My dad
was actually adopted by his uncle andaunt because they didn't have children. And
sometimes even if the adoption means youdon't go actually go to the other house,
you just basically like you just taketheir surname for some reason. I

(01:01:13):
don't know what the whole point ofit was. There was a lot of
like reasons behind it, like youknow, and sometimes, like what you
were saying about giving your kids likedifferent names and nicknames and stuff like that
to hide them, or or sometimesyou do it for for like fortune reasons,
and you know you were talking aboutI mean, there's there's a lot
to unpack about all the superstitions andtraditions and cultural items that you put in

(01:01:37):
there, fascinating, fascinating things.I mean, it's a time capsule.
Yeah, So basically I'm going totell everybody out there, I'm going to
plug this book if you want toread a bit of a time capsule,
if those of you who grew upin the eighties and nineties, it is
just such a fantastic look back intomemory lane for some certain things like finding

(01:01:57):
your husband right feeling that apple Iremember this in Midnight Peel and Apple in
One Street when I'm you see yourfuture husband and I'm just like spirit of
the coin. I that's so nineties. So that's one aspect of it.
But for me, it's just reallylearning about producta and Chinese culture, you
know, like the stories behind HungryGhost Festival. So basically, guys,

(01:02:21):
just buy this book and read itand support copy so that she can write
more of them. Thank you?Do you want to just go quickly to
write and book net questions Dina I, okay, copy. I mean we
can really have a long conversation becausewe haven't even gone into the ghosts,
into the jump Bann and all that. I know, Yeah, the hand
to jump Bann and then like likeJanna was talking about, like the adoption

(01:02:45):
thing, I think that's that's ahuge thing. For me. That was
a huge thing because it was traumatizingto some extent and there's like a lot
of backstory to that. And also, like you said, it's not just
I'm also curious, as sir.They don't just adopt adopting people adopting people.
It's just like they my dad wouldtake me to the temple and let
their deity adopt me. So yeah, it's kind of like, you know,

(01:03:08):
like, oh you you are thislike Kwani me I don't know,
like their daughter of quanium and somestuff like that. So it's it's like,
yeah, this is whole adoption thingwe could probably talk to. I
mean, Hindus do that as well, because I went to a first birthday
of my friend's niece and then atthe temple and then they got one of
their deities to adopt her so thatshe'll be protected as well, and and

(01:03:31):
you know, then then they planta tree. So I think it's it's
in all our cultures kind of overlapin a lot of ways, you know,
the belief system. And I mean, I don't know whether they want
to talk about how to, butmaybe we can just ask and one or
to write their questions now else thisconversation will go on for So do you

(01:03:52):
yourself, since you write about rituals, and all this stuff. Do you
hire yourself have a writing ritual?Like how much planny do you do before
you start writing on? I actuallyI'm actually not a ritual person, having
a neurodivergent mind. I'm just allover the place. I don't have a

(01:04:13):
particular thing that I can actually focuson. My process is like for me,
it's kind of strange, and I'mnot sure if it's an actually legit
process, like is it like questionmyself, Am I like a legit true
author? Because my process might bedifferent. I let the characters talk to
me, and they will talk,they will let me know what stories they

(01:04:38):
have to tell, and I justlet them tell it and it just comes.
And I know there are characters inmy book that didn't get that fair
share of time. They're not happyabout that. But like you know,
still, so the process that,like I said, there's no ritual,
there's no really process. It's justit just comes and whatever the character tells

(01:05:00):
me, I just write it downand then I'll arrange it, because otherwise
you'll be like all over the place. Tell me, Okay, I have
this thing that I need to it'simportant to me. I'll note it down
and then I'll expand it, writeit in a manner that's interesting enough to
be read, but other people arenot. Just like beats and pieces of
information everywhere. So yeah, that'smy process, which I really don't know

(01:05:28):
if it's a legit. Listen toit. Well, uncle in a coffee
shop telling you a story and hejumps from story to story exactly. And
when my son was editing my books, it's like, Mom, you have
ADHD. Your stories jumped all overplace at first to tell people you're going

(01:05:48):
to tell them this, and thenyou change your mind and say, oh,
actually no, I'm not going totell you now, And my son
is like, what, how canyou do that? But I did?
So that's me. Did you writewith an audience in mind? Like were
you thinking consciously, okay, Iwant to tell this to my son or

(01:06:09):
was it just something like you werejust telling it to like, you know,
just the world. Yeah, justtelling it Actually, yeah, like
I said, it was more aninternal taught process. It was supposed to
be the journal was supposed to befour my eyes only, so I never
ever thought I would just get itout and it could be something that people

(01:06:30):
would find interesting. So it wasjust like my own thoughts coming here and
there, and then you know howtaughts are or maybe my own thoughts.
It's just like I jumped from placeto place, and sometimes I get distracted,
and then I was like, oh, first I said I was going
to do this, and then suddenlyI went and do that, and I
forgot that I was supposed to dothis in the first place, and I
went to do that, and thenthat become the other and then okay,

(01:06:55):
So it was kind of like that, right. So, so now that
you are based in the US,do you envision people in the US reading
and how do they respond to thisbook? They actually responded very well.
A book club in the US actuallycalled me to do to attend one of

(01:07:17):
their readings together with them. Sothat's what I did a while ago.
This group of women with lipedema theyare based and they was like all over
they were from Australia, Canada,US, and they were this women that
some of them are kind of likehomebound, and they were like they were
white women in the middle of likeMiddle America and then you know in the

(01:07:41):
you know, kind of like Uluplaces and they love the stories and they
tell me what they resonate with andI was surprised. I was very surprised
how they could relate to it andhow much they could even you know,
share their own how they could kindof like their own experiences to what I

(01:08:02):
was writing about. So yeah,just what actually really surprised me. It's
like, yeah, people here,they do enjoy the stories. So I
didn't think it was like particularly oneof those what do you call it,
like exotic stories or you know,like how you don't know what a culture

(01:08:24):
is, and so when you readit you find it really fascinating because they
were not into oh how different youare. They were actually more about how
similar we are. I mean,this is why you were saying. It
is a story about family, isn'tit, And who doesn't have stories of
their family? Yeah right, Imean it might be different things that keep

(01:08:45):
them in line, or it mightbe different things that happen to them to
give them, like their childhood trauma. But it has that running theme,
yes, that you know, youcan't choose your family, so you love
them regardless even though they hurt you. Yes, that's true. That's true.
Things like that, I'm sure,which is why I like, I
say, like, you know,it was written honestly by the same time,
you know, it was a lotof love, but then you don't.
You're not overly sentimental about them either, which is I think that's why

(01:09:09):
it's a you know, it's it'sa fun read in that sense, but
there was some serious stuff in it. Yeah, were you Were you a
massive reader when you were younger?I mean, yes, I really liked
reading when I was young. Ialways had a book with me whenever I
go. But the thing is thatit was frowned upon because when I read

(01:09:30):
story books it means that I'm notreading for school. So I didn't do
well at all in school, sothere wasn't you know, Mills and Boons
just didn't cut it. All theromance novels and it brightened stories and stuff
like that just didn't you know,it didn't help you get aids at school.
So it was kind of frowned upon. And then as time goes by,

(01:09:50):
I still like to read, butI think I read less and less,
and which is something I regretted,because the more you read, the
better you write. Actually, soto me, I find that way.
I find difficulty finding nice flowery words. You know how when you read nice

(01:10:14):
flowery words and you feel wow,you know, to describe a bottle of
water, it's like wow. Theyuse the whole passage to describe it,
whereas for me it's just like,oh, you know what, I brought
the tumbler and I went to school. That sometimes just too much, you
know. That's that's what purple isn'tnecessarily good thing. But but I have
to say it reads very naturally.It reads you know, like the pros.

(01:10:40):
It does what it needs to dovery well. I will have to
say that. I mean, Ithink I think you don't have to worry
about that there, Okay, thankyou. Definitely, it's it's it's a
it's an easy not definitely not lightread, I would say, to the
places it definitely Like I I wasreading it at night and I thought,

(01:11:02):
hang on, I don't want tokeep reading this at night, especially at
certain things. I did not wantto keep reading it at night. No,
I did not. So yeah,So if you want a book that
is pushing a little bit of theyou know, a little bit spookier,
you've got that in this book.If you want a book that goes into

(01:11:24):
like, you know, family storiesand the things that happen in a family,
and also some of the not sonice things that happen to family as
well. I think, yeah,you definitely bring that as well. So
it's it's it's at story through.I can't tell you that, oh man,

(01:11:46):
spoiler right if I tell you yesor no, and then the readers
will be it's is like and it'strue, and I can believe it.
I can believe something no one canforget the first time seeing an animal slaughtered
at their home, and how matterof fact the people are when they're doing

(01:12:06):
it. Actually they are. Yeah, it's just like chickens. They were
just like, you know, slitthat throat, and I've seen that the
chicken will like run around with aslit throat. That happened to my grandmother.
She would like slip the throat,tuck the head under the wing,
and let it run round like thehead would be tucked under the wing.

(01:12:28):
I'm like traumatizing, right, itis extremely draumatic. Is that why you're
a vegetarian now? Dina? Manyother reasons? Yeah, I mean like
once you go and watch Harry rayakorbad thing that is a very formative part
of a Malago's childhood. Yeah,I know that that first realization that you

(01:12:53):
know the things that are on yourplate used to be alive, to sell
hours house was your pad exactly.So yeah, I think I think a
lot of that kind of thing itcomes through, the culture comes through.
I'm not Brana Gun, but Imean it felt very very close to my

(01:13:13):
own upbringing. It felt very closeto Yeah, it reminded me so much
of what had happened, and Ilove that there is so much that you
bring in that it's all tied intogether because you know the culture. You
might you might focus just on thesuperstitions and taboos, but it's it's all
part of life, right, It'sit's just normalized, like you think of

(01:13:34):
them as oh no, like wewant to talk about superstitions as if that
was something special, but it wasn'tspecial to you then, it was just
it was just part of it.Yeah, it was just part of how
I grew up. So that's whywhen you asked me to describe my book,
I'm like, Okay, you know, how how do I really do
that? Because it's a lot ofit I took for granted and just grew

(01:13:56):
up with. I think, yeah, yeah, I mean, like for
those of you who also want tofind out how to get rid of things
that or a mina and all thiskind of stuff. She also has all
these very exciting nuggets in her bookbecause I did not know. I don't
know those things, you know,like how I mean you just wann that
or you know, you know,going into going into that. I think

(01:14:16):
that would be a very important bookto write. How do you handle these
things? That's what scary of spooks? And how do you yes, how
do you tell them apart you know, and how do you like, how
do you not attract them? Andhow do you make sure they stay away?
Yeah? You know like like likelike the bananga, right, you

(01:14:38):
just have to turn the owner upsidedown so that they come through the feet
and that's how they die. Uhyeah, and you have to make sure
the thing doesn't catch you so youhave to run past running water. I
mean we know all this, butbut okay, So the question, I
guess one or two final questions isthat, so what are you working on?
I mean, like you you've illustratedyour book, right are you?

(01:15:00):
Would you do a graphic novel?No? I actually didn't. I didn't
illustrate it. I didn't No,no, no, it wasn't mine.
I can only I can only drawshort fat people like my my cartoons.
I cannot draw really thought you actuallyterm is Hawaii. Okay, it's not
short chib Yeah this this, yeah, this cartoon chibbs that I can draw.

(01:15:30):
But yeah, it was actually drawnby this illustrator called cool It could
Barrow used. The own name wasStanley, but he didn't want to be
associated with a Marbles a Marvel Stanley, so he's now called COOLi Barrow.
And uh he did my illustration forme, and actually I did ask him
to. I did commission him todo a few more new ones because when

(01:15:54):
I read the book it was sortof areas that I thought, oh,
how nice it would be to havelike a little bit more illustration. So
I did that just so fun.Maybe I'll just share it with my readers
and then they can just print iton and slaught it in the book or
something like that. So yeah,and the reason why I keep clipping my
own book is because of his illustration. I would Thinkure, I just look

(01:16:15):
at his fustration. I just reallyloved his illustration. Yeah yeah, I
mean I love this kind of linedrawings as well. That's completely my jab.
So okay, so the question whatare you working on at the moment
anything that you can tell us.Uh, yeah, actually not really working.
I'm in my third year of doingmy doctorate, so right now I

(01:16:41):
just finished collecting my data, andI need to graduate and finish my tastes.
So I'm pushing all, you know, desires to write down because if
I start writing or collecting stuff,I'll just go down the rabbit hole and
forget what I was. You know, what I had to do graduate in
a few years. So right nowall I'm reading is academic papers, like

(01:17:06):
research papers, and then trying tojust get my degrees. Yeah, tell
me, tell us it's it's it'son asiancy positions. I know. I
wish it's actually on happiness. Andolder women like as women middle like treatmen
like what do we I love that? I mean, is there going to

(01:17:29):
be booked? Because we need totalk about that. I love that.
Oh my god, could be maybewe could yeah, maybe if I could
get my data correctly. And becauseI did both qualitative and quantitative, so
I do have like women telling mewhat exactly is happiness to them and how
do they flourish? Because sometimes Isee, you know, you don't want

(01:17:49):
to just be like what a wife, a mother, and that's it.
Like you know, sister or youknow, you have your roles, but
who are you without those roles?You know, without this identity, you
have your own identity, and andI think to know what makes you happy,

(01:18:10):
not just you know, looking afteryour grandkids or your kids or your
parents. Even how do you flourishbasically, So that's what my thesis is
on, and also support that youget your attitudes towards aging affects a lot
how you flourish or not during yourold age. Do you see a menopause?

(01:18:31):
Yes, Actually that's the reason whyI chose women from forty five to
sixty five, because that's the timewhere you are like kind of in between.
You are like looking at your kids, looking at your parents, going
through menopause, losing your identity youknow, and then going through all kinds
of things. So how do yousurvive that error? And then you know,

(01:18:53):
and you're working at the same time, looking after your kids, looking
at your parents, trying to manageyour relationship, to lose yourself time,
it's quite I think it's it's common, not saying for everyone, but for
a while there I did that too. I kind of lost, and I
didn't know who I was just thatyeah I was a mother, or I

(01:19:14):
was a wife and a partner ora daughter, but I you know,
my happiness just didn't come first.It was always somebody else, and after
a while, you just run outof steam. So how do you balance
that? How do you get support? And you can always like go out
for like a drink with your friends, so sometimes you look online for support,

(01:19:38):
which is what I'm also looking at. How do you get support online
when you're not able to leave yourhouse because if your parents, you have
one parent that's bed ridden, andyou don't have a maid, So how
do you get support? So that'swhat basically my thesis is about looking at
support and how do you flourishy?You know, like middle aged women are

(01:19:58):
treasure trope of story. They're themost interesting protagonist because maybe I'm also middle
aged, right, But then it'sso hard to sell because I'm a scriptwriter.
It's so hard to sell that storylocally. Everybody just wants young,
nice looking people. And again,you know, even people want to watch
nice, young looking people fall inlove. But I'm like, if I
have to write another coming of age, I fall in love for the first

(01:20:20):
time story and kill myself, youknow, because it's that it's the person
who has like experienced all this stuffand how they carry on is what's interesting.
Yeah, and also, you knowwhat, people have the misconception that
we are not looking for romantic love. Oh my god, we are,

(01:20:43):
you know, like in our fifties, in our forties, you know,
sixties, behaven seventies. I mean, we are still looking for love.
And it's not easy if you're single, or if you're divorced, or you're
a widow or you know for someor separated, and and they think that,
oh, you know, we arelike targets for scam love scams,
and how could we be so stupid? And it's just it's just like all

(01:21:04):
this misconception about women at this ageand that you know, yeah, we
just don't have a life. Wejust need to take care our kids,
take your parents, go to work, bringing the money, and that's it.
Be a good wife. Well,I cannot wait for this book to
come out. It's gotta be abook. It's got to be a book.
Yeah, this is another conversation.Would you ever write not anonymously or

(01:21:30):
have you written anonymously? I mean, yeah, I did during during the
pandemic. Actually, I've written forMalaysian Health Coalition, I think, uh
yeah, I'm not sure, butyeah. And then and it was published
in some newspapers and I wrote itunder my own name, and it was

(01:21:53):
how to deal with the pandemic,how to deal with like, you know,
being in a COVID situation. Andyeah, so I did write articles
in my own name actually yeah,but I never did posted them in my
other account because it was my ownname, right, so so so mysterious.

(01:22:14):
Okay. We always would like toend with book recommendations, so just
as somebody who enjoys books, andwhat kind of books do you read,
and what would you recommend that youhave enjoyed for somebody who would like more
of what you have written here lookingafter the Ashes? For me, I

(01:22:34):
read this book gifted to me bymy son, and he's always been trying
to give me all the Spirits book, you know, and in one of
them that I really liked what wasSpirits Are Brought by Zancho, And I
really like that, and also likeBlackwater Sister by I think, yeah,

(01:22:55):
also by Zancho. Oh it's allbecause I know, oh, okay,
okay, yeah, I'm the secondof young because I like Young Z Show
as well, so too. Yeah, so yeah, it's like somehow I
kind of like, yeah, Ireally do like her writing, and so
I gravitated. I would recommend that. And the other one that I actually

(01:23:17):
read there was kind of similar tomine, was the reason one that was
published by Eva ever Wrong, TheHouse of Little Sisters. Yeah, that
was there was one that I actuallyenjoyed too, because she went into how
this little servant adopted seven girl,the life of this adopted seven girl,

(01:23:39):
and it was like it was tome, it seemed like an extension of
like, you know, a storyof this girl that like one of my
chi took or you know, soit like it was an extension of that
story how they were adopted into thefamily. But hers was like, you
know, going into the young girl'slife. So yeah, I really liked

(01:24:00):
I really liked her writing. Cool. Well, copy, Thank you so
much for spending time with us,to thank you for talking to me.
And it's just good to hear likewhat you wrote like about the books too,
like because sometimes different people tell medifferent things, and I often wonder
from the reader's perspective, you know, what do you like about it.

(01:24:20):
So, yeah, this interview wasactually a lot more far ranging than we
thought that we would be everywhere.He's like, he was very rambling.
Thank you so much for putting upwith our branding questions, especially me.
I did not give you my questionsahead of time, and yeah, I
used to entertain me, so thankyou so much. No, I mean,

(01:24:44):
like, I mean, whatever Isaid just now is that when I
read it, it did feel likeI know the people that I'm reading about,
and I feel that it is atime capsule, right, because people
have forgotten that we did all this, that we believed all this stuff.
And then just reading it back,I was like, oh my god,
Yeah, somebody put all this down. Thank god, because you know,
like you forget, you forget thatyou did all these ridiculous things like holding

(01:25:09):
a candle in front of a mirrorand yeah, one thing to see spirits
and yeah, and then being sofree when you swallow watermelon sea because that
was not in my like, yeah, did you tell me when you eat
watermelons, make sure you split outall the seat otherwise, you know,
if one goes into your stomach,it's going to grow into a watermelon tree
inside you. That was horrific someof them. Some of them we were

(01:25:34):
really really ridiculous, Like we haveto we have to do all these pun
tam off or something like that,just to see like who had the most
ridiculous. Yeah, I know,I know that. I Mean the one
that I always remember is don't putyour leg up in the air when you're
under you know what I mean,when you're when you're when you're lying on
your stomach. Yeah, when you'relying on your stommach, because then your

(01:25:56):
parents would die or die. Yourparents if you put two legs your parents
both your parents, if you putone would be one or the other would
die. Yeah, that's right.Yeah, and we're always so afraid of
our parents dying when we're young.So yeah, that's true. And I
remember, I think today I don'tput my legs up. I think it's
just it just became muscle memory.I remember things like don't don't open an

(01:26:17):
umbrella in the house because the snakewill come in. H Yeah, I
mean like that's there were so manythat, like you just reading your book
and it's like, oh okay,I remember that now. All that just
all came back and like wow,So it was a nice slice of like
like you know, nostalgia as well. Good luck in your teases and we

(01:26:43):
hope to have more stuff from youin the future. Thank you, and
thank you so much for being youknow, having me. And this is
my first podcast interview ever. Andyeah, I'm just yeah, I don't
know how to describe it, butI feel so happy. I need to
talk to all of you. It'sjust it's just great. It's just great.

(01:27:04):
Yeah, thank you so much forhaving this conversation with us. Thank
you. Okay, bye bye.So I hope everyone enjoyed that interview we
had with copy So yeah, Ithink that was that went really well actually,
and and well you went on alot longer than we thought there would.

(01:27:26):
But I've never really interviewed an anonymousauthor. Can I just say that,
oh yeah, oh yeah yeah,because if you notice that the photo
that you're going to see on ourInstagram, she's wearing a mask. So
all we really heard was her voice. So atally, for anonymous authors out
there, becaus it's a great wayto get interviewed because somebody needs to see

(01:27:50):
your face. That is very true. That is very true. Yeah,
but I personally could have gone onfor quite a while. With her because
you know, we didn't even touchknow, we touched the family rituals,
but we didn't even touch the ghosts. I saw how you how you cunningly
veered the conversation towards non ghostly topics, Styner, And that's very cunning of
you. It was, Yeah,I'm hunting as a as a self preservation

(01:28:13):
kind of tactic. So it's like, yeah, but I think what I
kind of what resonated with me aboutthe book was that lots of it seems
to be plucked out of my childhood, so it was kind of like a
travel down memory lane as well.I've forgotten how many rituals my family also

(01:28:33):
puts me through, how many lives. They also told me how many cautionary
tales was given to me. Soit's yeah, I think that's why I
kind of really really like it.And I enjoyed all the mischief as well,
that the cousins get up to.You know, I used to do
get up to some shenanigans with myown cousins. Yeah, and you know,

(01:28:55):
just just the idea of being arich family and adopting people to work
for you, but you are adopted, but you kind of like a servant
things like that, right, Peopleare very casual with children in those days
Funday dining. Yeah, yeah,I mean, I mean my mother in
law still tells me about how hurtshe felt that she was actually you know,

(01:29:16):
like sold to another family. Youknow, she she's she actually had
two surnames. So I think Ithink it's kind of the thing that people
used to do, Like it's kindof a self preservation kind of thing as
well. You know, like youdon't have you don't have that many children,
you have too many children, toomany mouse to feet, and you
don't don't have much food to goaround, so you kind of like other

(01:29:40):
families they're willing to adopt children eitherbecause you know, like like all sort
of weird reasons, right, Althoughthe servant one, that's new for me.
I've never heard that one before.To adopt a child for the express
purpose of being an extra pair ofhands in the house, that was new
to me. I think it's quitecommon actually, But but then again,

(01:30:04):
I mean in the in Malay familiesas well. You know, that's very
it is a very i won't saycasual, but it's a very accepted thing
to you know, like have apoorer relative or if you can't have children
yourself, you know, you endup looking after your you know, your

(01:30:24):
sister's kid or whatever. Because Isuppose it's also the idea that you have
the time to give attention to,you know, a child or two,
as opposed to a family of sixor seven right where you just don't have
enough hands or enough eyes. Somaybe it's also because in those days,
communities are more intertwined, people kindof look out for each other's children.

(01:30:45):
You know, if you live ina campone, you won't have this problem
really because kids just run everywhere,and then everybody kind of you know,
you end up eating at somebody else'shouse. So I suppose now it feels
a bit weird because everybody lives veryisolated in a way right in our little
nucleus. So anyway, so getthis book, guys. I mean,
I guess that's pretty much what meand Diana are saying. So that's our

(01:31:09):
show for today. We'll probably doone or two more, probably and then
finally draw season six to a close. Maybe the next episode will be on
Autumn Reads. I know we're longoverdue for that. I hope you guys
are still doing your book challenges.I'm not sure what's happening there, but
me and Diana will of course tallystuff up by the end of the year.

(01:31:29):
So keep on, you know,keep on reading. And as usually,
you can find us on ig wherewe are the most active, at
TBNT Books, TBNT pot on Twitter, and two boonet Stalking on FB.
We also like to thank our fewpatrons who are still sticking with us,
and you can also reach us atbooknet stocking at gmail dot com. Okay,
and thank you so much for copysofor joining us for this conversation all

(01:31:53):
the way from California. Yeah,so that's a twelve hour time difference.
We will end this episode with aquote from Keith Henson, who wrote on
subjects like space engineering, evolution,and psychology, and he said, lie
detection is like a language. There'sa learning window. Telling whoppers to small

(01:32:15):
children seems to be a family traditionin many families. Wow, very very
I really like that. No,but but I like to find that lie
detection is a language. It's almostthat you learn how to tell fips from
reality when you're a kid by kindof making up your mind, you know.
So, I don't know, maybethose you know, cheeky aunties and

(01:32:40):
terrible lying cousins actually did us afavor so that we can judge people better
and maybe don't get scammed so much. It probably gave a lot of us
trust issues as well, So yes, through there's always the cons, you
know, I'm just looking at thepros, all right. Everybody, have
a good meeting, week a hit, and month a hit. Bye bye

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TBNT S06E16 | Looking After the Ashes with Kopi Soh

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.css-14f5ked{margin:0;word-break:break-word;display:-webkit-box;-webkit-box-orient:vertical;box-orient:vertical;-webkit-line-clamp:2;overflow:hidden;}TBNT S06E16 | Looking After the Ashes with Kopi Soh