Short-Story Archives: The Stain (Part 2)

    The sun has set into the island's hills in the east side of George Town which brings in chilling breezes from the port that cool the sweat on my back. "See, I suffer much, just because, of your laziness, you owe me, a favor Ah Seng," Ah Fook tells me with that smirk, a smirk so classic that even with a bag full of grain on my back I can still see it. "I could have, gone home, played mahjong, and have my, dinner early. See how, self-sacrificing, am I?" he continues, panting while carrying another bag of grain on his back 
    "So all that talk of being brothers has come to this huh? Did you remember that time you borrowed money from that kelinga man?" I ask him back and he replies with a grunt. "You forgot to pay the him even when he specifically told you that a 'Goddess of Destruction' will come for you if you fail to pay back, then you laughed and said an Indian goddess has no interest in a Chinaman. You remember what happened next?"
    Ah Seng sighs, "A dog bit my leg, yes, yes," he replies dismissively.
    "It delivered her poison, you were so sick you could not move. Now I, have to personally go to the kelinga to apologise and pay back with my own money. Then, I also slashed my back with a knife in front of him to satisfy her need for vengeance."
    "That is, not my fault, you are stupid, to fall for, a kelinga's, dirty pranks," Ah Fook replies while shooing a little boy who has been pestering him a while, trying to sell him some oranges.
    "So you are the master of all things Indian gods now? I told you not to play with these sort of things," I nag him, but as usual he dismisses it saying I am paranoid, too superstitious, too easily tricked. It is his pride talking. "After all that, your legs got better right?"
    "Yes, yes, yes, you are right brother, I can never repay you," he finally relents as we both put the bags of grain on the warehouse's door. The boss nods and gives a few coins to each of us before going back and closing the warehouse. We were lucky this time, usually the boss will starve us for the day. But his recent engagement to a girl of a wealthy Hokkien family may have lightened his mood.
    We wipe the sweat off our foreheads and count our daily pay. "Do you want to make a little more money?" Ah Seng continues with a wide grin and a blinking eye. Ah, his schemes again. I nod to satisfy my amusement. "There is another Hokkien boss who looking for laborers to carry cargo at night. You want? Pay is good."
     I feel bad to disappoint his enthusiasm. The night is setting in and I just want to go back to the dormitory and rest for another day of work. "Work until bones break for what? Enough to eat, enough to drink, what more do you want?"
    I did not mean what I said, I though it might make him accept the decline better. However, his face was aghast. "You mix with these kelinga and malai too much and now you sound like them!" he mocks me jokingly while patting my back in a friendly manner. "Live just to have enough to survive, what life is that?"
    "What do you want to do with so much money?"
    "Open business, find a wife, be rich, have children."
    "But there are so little women here, why would they marry a poor labourer like you?"
    "Then, open business, be rich, find beautiful wife, have children," he answers while laughing loudly. I admire his ambition, my wish is to earn enough so I can sail back to China and live out my old days in the village. Being unsure, I shrug. "Haiya, come, I only do this because this brother is trying to taking care of you. This is opportunity. You are stronger so you will get better pay. See, with my brains and your brawns, we can take on anything."
    Ah Fook does have a point, he is after a Hokkien clansman, a work-mate, a close friend; It is only proper I agree.

Short-Story Archives: The Stain (Part 1)

This is a little short story I have written to paint you guys a picture of life in the colonial Southeast Asia. The story will be divided into multiple parts. Here is part 1:


"Ah Seng, Ah Seng, eat dinner!" a familiar voice calls to me. I await squatted outside the family hut that belonged my father's father. My father squatted next to me nonchalantly as usual. Some few yards away, I keep vigil watch over my grandfather who laid on a mat inside a small hut of thin wooden planks made just for him. He stopped walking ever since his leg swelled with pus. We had no money for any sort of doctors and he insists that his time has come and was unwilling for the family to spend another coin more on him. Thus he remained doomed to that little prison, slowly waiting for the afterlife.

"Ah Seng, Ah Seng? When are you getting a wife?" My mother asks in Hokkien while serving rice with steamed vegetables. I remain silent. "Ah Seng, Ah Seng, if you don't have wife, how do you have children? How do you pass on the family name? You must think of the family first," She continues. My father seems oblivious to mother's nagging and the world as he chomps on his food. The smell from his clothes tells me he has been smoking that vile opium again who had poisoned his body and mind rendering him unable to work. Poor mother, I thought as I scowl at him.

"Ah Seng, Ah Seng, take this bowl of rice and give it to grandfather, if he is going to die better a full ghost than a hungry ghost." I nod. I have been put in charge of delivering food and water to my grandfather but I dread at that duty; the hut is fouled with the stench of his rotting legs which had by now grown into a grotesque mixture of red blood, white bone, yellow pus, and black dead skin. He would smile gently at me each time I come, but I could not bare to return the gesture. After I am done with my solemn duty, I would quickly rush home to wash my hands off the disease, the misfortune, and perhaps the guilt of failing to be a filial grandson.
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"Ah Seng, Ah Seng!" the voice in Hokkien pulled me out from the clutches of the dream demons right before cold water splashes on my face. I jerk up from my gunny sack bed in response. "Woi, Ah Seng, time to toil! Boss said he will make you starve if you dare to be late again."

I immediately scan the coolie dormitory with my eyes which are in full attention and in shock; the dormitory is empty save for me and Ah Fook. "Die!" I exclaim and quickly rush out of the dormitory with Ah Fook. "Thank you for waking me, but you will also be late." I asked him while we rush towards the jetty.

"That is what brothers do!" he replies with a smile. He is the closest thing I have to a family ever since I sailed to Penang. This place is foreign and the work is heavy but unlike back in Fukkien, I will not starve working hard here; that is of course if the boss will not have my head this time. Despite it all, Ah Fook made all this bearable. We had countless adventures and managed to bail each other out even at the worst of times. Perhaps meeting Ah Fook is my fortune in life which coincidentally is what his name means in Hokkien.