My first close encounter that I have any recollection of, happened when I was probably 5 or 6 years old. My mum was working for this family in Jalan San Ah Wing - located somewhere off Jalan Gurney (today's Jalan Semarak). This family was essentially a Burmese/Chinese man with a German wife and they had 3 kids at that time. Big garden, with lots of bushes all over. It must have been because I was playing with these kids at an early age that I was better in English than most of my classmates when I started schooling. I did not even go to Kindergarten as my mum could not afford it.
One day, while playing in the garden, in the late evening - i.e. sun was still up , but it was going to get dark soon, I heard an old lady's voice calling me using my home name. I looked around and did not see anyone. Again, the voice called out and I swear (even today) that the sound came from behind one of the bushes. I went to the bush, looked around and still saw no one. I did not answer the voice and did not mention this to my mum until only just a few years ago, I dragged out this story during one of the ghost telling sessions. My mum on hearing this said that if I had told her then, she would have quit her job and moved elsewhere. Apparently, during the Japanese occupation, many people were killed around that area and she things it may have been the spirits of those killed. I personally think that since it was an old lady's voice I heard, it may have been my maternal Grandma (my mum's mum), who passed away when my mum was about 14 years old. Just looking in to see how her grandchild was.
25 years ago, I went for my first training trip outside the country. I had been working for HP for 1 year then and finally got scheduled for 2 trainings. I had to first show up in Waltham, Massachusetts to be trained on operating and supporting the Ultrasound instruments used by the Medical profession. 2 weeks after that I was scheduled to be in Palo Alto, California to be trained on Mass Spectrometers. That October, I also did my first round the world trip. I flew from KL to London and stopover for a night. Did Hyde Park, Piccadilly Circus and Chinatown. Then flew off to Boston Logan's airport to get to Waltham. From Waltham, I flew to San Francisco. After the training, I flew back via the Pacific, stopping over in Hawaii (those were the days when the planes could not fly non stop Frisco to HK).
By the time I got to Palo Alto, the Halloween atmosphere was just starting up.
There were miles and miles of pumpkins everywhere. I even manage to have this photo taken in a pumpkin patch, just like Charlie Brown, waiting for the Great Pumpkin to emerge at sometime!. Yes that is puny ole me!!
And many of these pumpkins were not your average sized pumpkins. I took this giant (could have done better by putting something bedside it to reference the size), which was about almost 2 feet in diameter!! 
I was so obsessed with giant pumpkins that I asked one of my US colleagues to send me some seeds. Somehow, those seeds never did arrive. I think the customs confiscated them.Okay, with that digression, I'll continue with the next narration. Since young, I think many of us think that we can see or sense the other dimension! Many older people always says that children, being pure and naive? can see things which adults cannot. I tend to believe this to be so, because since young, I have always thought that I can sense it when something don't seem right. I have always had the the feeling that I have a guardian angel looking after me.
How else can one explain the following incidents. As a young boy, I have occasionally lived with my Maternal Grandfather, especially those times when my mum changed jobs and the new employer could not accommodate 2 young kids (my sister and I). Granpa lived in Datuk Keramat, back in the days when it does not matter whether you were a Malay or not.
One day, while playing hide and seek with my step-uncles (2 of them are younger than me), I was trying to hide the the boot of my granpa's car - an old Hillman that was no longer working. I opened the boot, a cobra living inside raised up it's hood and head and I quickly slammed the cover down. A second slower and I would not be around to blog on this today.I must have shouted very loudly during this time as all my step uncles came over to ask what happened. Try as they might, they could not find the snake.
On that piece of real estate that my Granpa staked out after the Japanese occupation, we had so much space that we had our own vegetable and fruits garden. Granpa would grow enough to sell on the market, so we hardly ever had to buy any vegetables. We had no electricity. Grandpa would light up a couple of hurricane lamps at night. For water, we had a well. The well was made of concentric cement rings measuring almost 2.5 feet wide and was at least 15 feet deep. To a small kid who was about 3 feet high, that was deep!!. Adults used an adult pail to bring up water from the well and children had their own much smaller pails. When the adult pails are full of water, they do weigh a ton (to a small kid). One day, I decided that it was about time that I try to fetch water using the adult pail. I dunked the pail in, filled it to the brim and pulled on the rope. The weight of the pail pulled me over the edge of the well, head first! Somehow, my guardian angel must have been working overtime. I flipped 360 degrees and landed with my feet apart on the second ring of the well. Again, I must have shouted as everybody came rushing over to see what happened. My legs were like jelly, but I did not drop into the water. Some years later, one of my cousin brother did the same stunt and fell right in. Luckily, one of the uncles heard him and managed to save him.
Who says there are no guardian angels??
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