by D. G. Lum
Over several months, the couple repeatedly ignored advice they received from friends and family members. The grandparents of the children became increasingly worried about the couple’s gambling addiction. But the couple was not listening.
Then, one quiet Thursday night, something terrible happened. The family of four had dinner as usual and watched some television programs afterward. Then the couple decided to put their kids to bed early. They felt an itch to go to the casino for a night of excitement.
The mother brought the kids into their room and told the son to sleep well. “Mum and Dad are going out,” she said as she kissed her lovely boy. He was only six years old. “Take care of your sister, okay? We’ll be back late. Sleep well.”
The boy looked at his mother. It was not the first time this had happened but he missed the bedtime stories that his mum used to tell him before he went to bed every night, back when she hadn’t gambled so frequently. He knew there would be no story tonight.
At four years old, his little sister was a little less understanding. She said, “I want my princess story, Mummy.” But her request fell on deaf ears.
Her mother tucked her into bed and gave her a big kiss. “Not tonight,” she said, and added, “I will tell you two princess stories tomorrow, okay?”
It took the couple more than thirty minutes to get their kids to sleep. Then they dressed up and got ready to go for their regular casino adventure. Before they left, the mum went to the bedroom to have a last look at her kids. She didn’t know it was the last time she would ever see them.
“Let’s go make some money,” called her husband. “It will be quick.” They left their apartment at 9:40 p.m.
It was a night of heavy betting. The couple had game after game of baccarat and pai gow. Luck was on their side. They had won enough money to buy a brand new car for the whole family. The winning streak just did not stop. They were in a world of their own. Nothing could stop them.
At around midnight, the mother was focusing on peeling her baccarat cards to reveal the patterns. It was then she suddenly felt a sense of intense guilt for leaving her kids at home alone. She felt strange. It was something she could not explain, and her eyes started to tear. Then she wiped off the tears from her eyes and revealed her cards to the dealer and gamblers at her table. She had won again! She thought to herself that at this rate, she would be a millionaire by daylight.
Just as everyone cheered on her table, she heard a faint scream that sounded like her son’s voice. She stood up and looked around. “I must be imagining things,” she said to herself, shaking her head. “How could he be here?” Feeling increasingly uncomfortable and worried about her kids, she walked briskly over to her husband and told him it was time to go.
“Now?” her husband shouted. He had just won another round at the pai gow table. “But I’m winning,” he added.
She gave her husband a worried look and insisted. Although he was a gambling addict, he knew how much she loved her kids and decided to go. “One more and that’s it,” he said.
They got out of the casino at 12:35 a.m. and decided to walk home, which was just ten minutes away for them. It was a calm and quiet night, and they could see the stars.
As they turned a corner, just a hundred meters away from their apartment, they were shocked to see people crowding along the alley. Smoke filled the sky and there were a couple of firemen standing below their block. Ferocious fire filled one of the apartments in the distance.
The mum and dad watched in shock and horror. It was their four-storey block and thick smoke was coming out from their apartment. Desperate and lost, the couple ran quickly towards the block. Two policemen stopped them at the apartment entrance.
“My kids, my kids… no…!” screamed the mum as the neighbors watched.
An old lady shook her head in sadness. She lived just a floor below the family’s apartment.
The dad looked around to see if his kids were with the crowd. But they were nowhere to be found. A few distressed neighbors pointed their fingers at the apartment.
“They seem to be up there still!” one said.
“I could hear the boy scream earlier!” another said, as she burst out crying.
The dad held his hands over his head. He could not believe what he saw and heard. “It can’t be true. They must have escaped somehow!” he screamed out.
The mum grabbed hold of the dad and cried. She lost control, calling, “My children, oh my children, no…” and then fainted on the spot.
No one knew what happened that night in the apartment. How did the fire start? What were the kids doing when it happened? Did they cause the fire? When did they know that the apartment was on fire? Did they try to escape?
Many, however, heard the boy scream at the top of his voice at around midnight. Some were woken up by his horrified shrieking. Others said they did not hear anything at all.
The police, however, confirmed that the kids perished in the fire. Nothing was left inside the apartment except ashes. The grandparents were devastated. And when the media reported that the couple was gambling when all this happened, their families and neighbors turned against them for being so irresponsible.
The mum could not stop crying for days. She could hear her kids screaming for her and pleading for her to help them. But she did not come to their aid. She was busy gambling. No matter how much she and her husband made that night, no matter how big a car they could now afford, nothing could bring her children back to her. She should have not left them alone. If she had been home, she could have saved her children. They were priceless.
After the funeral, the couple withdrew from their families and friends. Still clearly distressed and upset by their loss (who would not be), they deliberately tried to avoid seeing anyone.
The police did not press charges for negligence. After all, they did not want the community to turn against the casino and see it as the root of the problem.
Several days later, on a Thursday afternoon, the mum and dad took a cab to the construction site on the west end of Taipa Island. No one knows why they selected that spot. Maybe they had wanted to live there with their children when it was completed.
The husband and wife were well dressed and prepared. They brought pictures of their kids and a few pieces of their remaining clothes. The mum even took some of their ashes from the urns. She thought this way they would meet again in the underworld. She missed them dearly.
Two construction workers at the building site spotted the parents’ bodies at around 11:00 p.m. that night. The couple had hung themselves. The horrified workers described how neat and tidy the corpses were at the scene. One even said that the woman looked like she was smiling. In the press conference that followed, the police announced that the couple died about one or two hours before they were found.
No one knows what went through the couple’s minds. They had spoken to no one about their plans for suicide and left no final letter. Their close family members refused to speak to the media. They were deeply depressed by the loss of the parents and children all in such a short period of time.
After construction of the apartment blocks was completed, many local residents moved into Taipa Island. As a new establishment with a big compound, multiple children’s playgrounds, and nice gardens, the building project was considered a premium residential area in Macao. Indeed, for those who live there, it is a quiet, peaceful and spacious place—a fine living environment for many expatriates and their families.
However, some of the residents and many foreign maids who worked for expatriate tenants often claim they see and hear things in the middle of the night. One claimed she saw a family of four having supper near one of the playgrounds at around midnight. They were all dressed in white and disappeared into the darkness when one of them (a little girl) spotted her. Another maid claimed to have heard a boy screaming in distress at night near a fountain. When she went to investigate, she found nothing.
The wife of an expatriate was pushing her boy in
a stroller near the compound one night. She claimed she saw a couple, each holding an urn, walking around the park. They were both well dressed but did not speak. The woman also appeared very upset. She said they disappeared into one of the blocks.
On one Thursday, a woman who worked part-time at the management office repeatedly received distress calls from a boy pleading for help from his mother. He said there was a fire in the kitchen and he could not find his sister. When she tried to prompt him further, the boy hung up. Police came to investigate but found nothing. The calls were dismissed as prank calls. The woman quit the next day.
Finally, one Thursday night, when my friend was returning home from work, he spotted a little girl playing by herself in one of the playgrounds. He noticed her arms, legs, and dress were badly burnt. After he parked his car, he walked to the same playground to investigate but found no one. He got sick the next day and moved out of his apartment two weeks later.
Mothers love their children while children adore their mums. Even after death, it seems, kids try to reunite with their mothers. Some people claim they can see ghosts, while others cannot. Others say they only see these things on unlucky days. The fact is ghosts may live around us: they may eat, sleep, and play like the way we do. Perhaps one family of ghosts has decided to call Taipa Island home.
Chapter 11: Fishing for a Ghost?
Each year, millions of visitors arrive in Macao. Many do so only to gamble. In 2010, more than 20 million people visited Macao and its thirty-plus casinos. Around half of these visitors came from mainland China, and the Guangdong Province in particular. Official surveys also revealed that more than half of the visitors to Macao gambled in its casinos.
While the Macao government is interested in promoting the region’s cultural heritage, many visitors are not interested in learning more about it. Macao’s residents have first-hand experience with rowdy, hardcore Mainland Chinese, many of whom are only interested in the area’s gambling aspect and nothing else. Macao’s government and residents find it hard to cope with the huge influx of overseas gamblers. Sadly, an expanded gambling market has led to more crime, prostitution, problem gamblers, and other social problems.
For example, a few years ago, two successful casino VIP room executives were found murdered in the nearby city of Zhuhai. There were rumors that trial gangs were fighting over their gambling territories. The media also frequently reports on Chinese public servants indulging in gambling in Macao and using public money to fund their gambling adventure. Some have been caught, jailed, and even executed by the Chinese government.
In Macao, a few dealers were caught stealing casinos’ gambling chips and money. Some dealers were found to be problem gamblers themselves: they gambled heavily during off-work hours and borrowed large amounts of money from loan sharks to finance their losses. When they failed to pay up, debt collectors used nasty techniques to coerce them to pay. Often, family members got in the way and were dragged into an abyss of gambling debts, violent, and other problems.
I was in Macao in 2005 when a friend told me this story:
My name is Ah Fai and I live close to the ruins of St. Paul’s, a famous landmark in Macao. What I am about to tell you happened to me less than six months ago. It was an encounter I will never forget.
As you know, I love fishing. Because the sea surrounds Macao, there is no shortage of fishing areas. One of my favorite fishing places is the Nam Van Lake. Nam Van Lake is one of two man-made lakes in the Macao Peninsula. Every May or June, a dragon boat festival is held there. Many dragon boat teams take part in this international racing event. During the mid-autumn festival, many people in Macao go out to enjoy the new moon at night and to worship the gods with colorful lanterns. One of the traditional spots people go to in order to perform these activities is the Nam Van Lake.
My story begins with one of my numerous night fishing trips on Nam Van Lake. I love the peace and quiet of night fishing. However, everything changed after one night’s experience. It was an encounter I will never forget.
On one summer Saturday night, I picked up my fishing rod and baits, and decided to try my luck at Nam Van Lake. It was a hot, hazy night. There were few cars on the road leading to Nam Van Lake. I took my reliable scooter and rode to the car park located beside the lake. I looked at my watch. It was 9:50 p.m. I figured that, with any luck, I would be back home before midnight.
I parked my scooter and walked to my usual fishing spot: a secluded site that was tucked away from all traffic, both cars and humans. I sat down and prepared my fishing rod. Everything went according to my expectations. An hour later, I had caught three fish of decent weight. I was a happy man.
At around 11:45 p.m., tired and a bit sleepy, I decided to pack up and go home. I turned to my gear and started to pack up. Just at that moment, I spotted another man standing about fifteen to twenty meters away from me.
I was surprised, as I thought I had been alone all this while. “He must have come in quietly,” I thought to myself, and decided to show some friendliness. “How’s the night? Any luck?” I called out while preparing to go.
The man ignored me. “He must be really focused on getting something today,” I thought, but I was still a bit annoyed by his rudeness.
A few seconds later, after a closer examination, I realized he was not holding on to any fishing rod. It was dark but the distant city lights gave out just enough light for me to make out his face. The man looked like he was in his forties. He was wearing a blue shirt and white shorts, stood about 1.7 meters tall, and was rather plump. His clothes were wet. He looked troubled and appeared to be panting heavily as he stared straight into the water.
“Are you all right?” I called out, softly this time, and started making my way over to him. I tried not to alarm him. “Do you need any help?”
Just then, the man suddenly plunged into the water.
“No!” I screamed. There was something wrong with this man. I knew he was not going for a night swim. I sensed a suicide.
I ran as fast as I could to the spot where he jumped and stared into the water. In my mind I was thinking, “If he was just swimming, he would surfaced by now. Maybe he is just swimming. Don’t panic!” I waited for a few seconds for the ripples to clear. But the man was nowhere to be seen.
So I jumped into the water too. It was deep and pitch dark. I took a few dives deeper underwater, hoping to catch hold of anything that was human. It was in vain and I swam out further to try again. After a few minutes, I knew it was a useless effort and I needed help. So, I hurriedly swam back to the shore.
When I was almost at the shore, I felt something pulling my left foot. I turned around and tried to reach beneath my foot with both my hands. I thought to myself, “This must be him!”
But I was dragged further into the water. Panicking and rapidly losing strength, I kicked and struggled to free myself. I knew if I did not do anything, I would drown. I gathered my strength and, with a hard jerk, managed to free myself, swim back, and climb onto a rock at the shore.
Safe on the rock, I turned around. The man was nowhere to be seen. I ran to the road to seek help and was surprised to see two policemen at the car park. The policemen, who were equally surprised to see me, came to my rescue.
I took a few quick breaths and told them what happened. As one of the policemen called for backup, the other followed me back to the fishing spot. There were still no traces of the man.
Within the next hour or so, more help arrived, including police divers and ambulances. I sat on the kerb by the road while waiting for news. Emergency personnel worked to find the man. Moments later, I was told to go back home.
Just then, someone in the water called out, “We found it!” All the emergency workers dashed to the spot where the discovery had been made. There was some commotion. The medical team retrieved a body and placed it in a bag.
Two police officers then came to me and started asking me a bunch of questions. They told me that the divers had found a badly decomposed body of
a man, around 1.7 meters tall.
“This cannot be!” I said confusedly. “He was still alive an hour ago. It’s not him!” I told them. After much discussion, the officers asked me to go home first and said they would contact me later if further investigation was required.
One week later, a police officer came to my apartment. He showed me a photo of the victim. It was the same man: the man I met during that horrible night, the one who jumped into the water. The officer told me that the man was probably dead two to three months before he was found. He was a Mainland Chinese and a regular visitor to one of the casinos in town. Further investigation revealed that this man had owed a lot of money to a few local loan sharks. The police suspected that a Chinese gang might have murdered him after he failed to pay back his huge debt.
The officer asked if I knew the man personally. I told him frankly that I had only met the man on the day the body was found. “That is impossible,” the officer said, adding, “You must be seeing things!” The officer left after completing all the necessary paperwork. Before he went, he told me not to worry, gave me a talisman, and suggested that I go to the local temple to seek some advice. And I did!
Chapter 12: An Encounter with a Ghost Prostitute
Most people do not think highly of prostitution as a profession. However, as one of the longest professions in human documented history, prostitution is commonly associated with gambling, especially in Macao. At night, many prostitutes can be seen prowling Macao’s casinos, looking for interested customers. It is estimated that there are around 2,000 prostitutes in Macao.
