Ash Monday

iTunes' party shuffle is playing: Let Me Light Your Fire - Jimi Hendrix - The Singles Album Volume 1

I had lunch and dinner al fresco today. Big mistake. I forgot we have a festival enjoyed by the superstitious, the supernatural and the superstitious arsonists. I've been asked several times today, is it the last day of the Hungry Ghost Festival? It might've been, given the number of people burning paper money, joss-sticks and other flammable items* today as if it were the last day of the Hungry Ghost Festival. I also saw banquet tables full of almost dehydrated Chinese dishes laid out in front of altars, for the benefit of ghosts, right after the President's Star Charity. We are such a caring society. We should burn effigies of Tay Ping Hui and Jamie Yeo so they can go do stunts for the dead as well. I mean, if we're progressing as a nation, we'd better revamp the remittance service industry to make it more efficient. All this burning of cash is a waste of resources and contributing to greenhouse gas emission aggregates. Burn one cash card. Heck, one credit card. No, wait, cannot, the interest rates will kill them (hur hur!) How about burning a paper ATM machine? A whole paper bank? I had ash in my hair, ash in my food, ash in my drink. I didn't even enjoy smoking after my meals. It was that bad. And now I'm at home, and I don't dare go out because the ghosts might ask me where I kept their spare change. *And there wasn't a single fire extinguisher in sight! Burn a whole paper hotel while you're at it. Else the ghosts have no place to stay, have to come knocking at your door, then you know.