The prayers did not work … neither was I blessed

NOTE : PLEASE READ WITH AN OPEN MIND

Well, the above suggestion means that the following writings may or may not cause some uneasiness for some people … so I hope one can read with an open mind.

Here it goes.

Recently a friend came over to visit me after more than two months of lockdown … it is good to be able to move about and do some visiting albeit the strict cautious and distancing procedures. 

Being a very religious person, the first thing my friend said when we met was … “thank god, the covid19 situation is getting better”.

But for me ... thinking more from a scientific front, I said … “not really ... thanks to the doctors, nurses, medical assistants, labs technicians, police, army, hospital cleaners, helpers, delivery boys … all those so called “front liners”. Thanks to them, they are the ones who are making sure that the situation is getting better”.

Then my religious friend added … “thanks to god and our prayers also lah”.

I replied … “of course” … we both laughed and continued our chatters over teh tarik at the local mamak shop. You see, we can get along well, not based on what we believe … more importantly it is about how we behave.

Many know that I am not into gods, deities, ghosts, ghouls, devils, demons, fairies, angels or spirits  ... I don’t believe there is a heaven or a hell, neither do I believe there are divine beings controlling everything in the universe.

I tell you why.

You see … I was a sickly child when I was born … a thin, skinny and sickly boy with a “breathing problem”. Actually it was asthma but in the village I was growing up then, it was believe to be something else. I was told that my grandmother even fed me opium believing it can stop the breathing problem … hmmmm, I got “high” a lot earlier than my peers.

Everyone in the village knows me … because my mom would go around seeking folk remedies and cures to try to get me better.

Apart from opium, which I am sure I was given because it is true that my grandmother was an opium smoker … let me tell you the other stuffs that I tasted ... errrr, no ..."tested" will be a more appropriate word. It still scares me to even think of it now. There were cockroaches roasted over wood fire, little baby mice dipped into alcohol and swallowed whole, grounded dried black bees prescribed by the Chinese medical shops, crocodile meat, monitor lizard meat, some kind of dried lizard and a whole bunch of herbs and strange plants. I was “tested” with very strange stuffs.

And if those were not enough, my mom also resorted to getting divine help … she would pray at temples and seek advice from mediums. There were suggestions that I was disturbed by “dirty” things (ghosts, ghouls and demons) and believing in strange Taoist practice, my mom “gave” me to a few gods and deities as a godson, so that I would be blessed by them and they will scare the “dirty” things away. From what I could remember … I was “kai” (given as godson) to God Erlang, Goddess of Mercy, Monkey God, General Guan Yu (Kuan Kung), Nine Emperors God and a few more, I am quite sure.

Anyway, after all that my mom had tried and done, I did not get any better … the prayers did not work … neither was I blessed.

I can understand what my mother did and why … she grew up in a rubber estate in Beranang and only went to primary school for a few years. She did what she thought was best for me, trying everything to get me better because she loved me dearly.

I was still a very sickly boy until I was 10 years old. Then a colleague of my father told my mom to take me to a government clinic … it was a free clinic for employees of LLN (now called TNB) located at Bangsar. That changed everything … I was given proper medications for my asthma and slowly I got better.

I remember … every time when the asthma strikes, my dad would borrow the neighbor’s Morris Minor … took me straight to Bangsar Clinic (how we called it then) and all it took was an injection and I could breathe comfortably again. Yes, it was a miracle … a miracle of science.

When I attended secondary school, I was asthma free and was a very active sporting student … it was science that stopped the asthmatic attacks. It was proper medicine and proven methods that made me better. Since then … I stopped believing in gods, deities, ghosts, ghouls, devils, demons, superstitions and definitely not opium.

For my mom … she still believe that the gods must have something to do with my progress and so the praying continues, not for my health but for my studies. Hoping that I will be successful in my studies … she went to seek divine help from Indian temples.

Sadly, I did not get through the O-Level exams … got an overall Grade II only. And my mom was wondering what she missed … why her prayers did not work and I was not blessed with good exam results.

NO, it has nothing to do with her … it was very clear that I only have myself to blame … I am the one who screw it all up.

But my mom told me that I still have to “pay back” for what she asked from the temples and I actually went to carry milk up the 272 steps of Batu Caves during the Thaipusam festival the following year. I did it not because I believe in divine intervention … I did it because I know how happy it will make my mom feel, believing that she has done whatever she can for her son.

As I grew into a young adult … I learned of more facts, evidences, proofs, realities, discoveries and findings of science. My fondness of reading got me into books and publications of modern and progressing topics.

By then, I was totally out of religion.

Don’t get me wrong ya … yes, I am not religious but I am NOT anti-religion. It is just that religion does not work for me. It works wonders for many people … like my friend who believe that his prayers worked, the covid19 situation is getting better and the world is blessed by what he believed.

As for me … like when I was young, I don’t think that my mom’s prayers worked … neither was I blessed by what she believed. I know very well that my “breathing problem” was treated successfully by science, my bad academics was my own doing and now I believe that only science can find a solution to end the current pandemic situation.