11. Life as a Taoist Priest

Our grandfather Chan was a very well-known Taoist priest, and his work required him to travel as far north as Kepala Batas in Province Wellesley, Penang and the whole of Perak. My colleague, Hor Ah Har, whose parents lived in Kepala Batas told me that they knew our grandfather Chan as he often visited their area in his heydays.

Grandfather Chan had a god-son who live in Lenggung, Perak. His parents own a sawmill there. In the mid-90s, I took our parents and visited him and his family in Lenggung. One of his son operates a seafood restaurant in town.

In the old days, Taoist priests usually worked alone and traveled far and wide to serve the people. Grandfather Chan had a lot of responsibilities and had to follow certain religious ethics. He could only accept certain amount of payment, for example, he was paid $3.60 for prayers services in Sitiawan which was more than 80 km from Taiping.

Performing funeral services and rituals were some of the toughest and most tiring tasks as it could last from three to five days with praying sessions lasting until the wee hours of the morning. It was hard work and not much pay then, very unlike the commercialized and profit-oriented services offered by priests and monks nowadays.

Thus, it was not uncommon to find Taoist priests indulged in smoking opium and drinking alcohol - two of the many harmful vices in the old days. They had taken to opium and alcohol as a means of 'revitalizing' themselves physically and mentally after long and tiring hours performing funeral rites. And our grandfather became a victim too.

However, it was not opium (nor tuberculosis which was very prevalent then) that killed him, but rather his addiction to samsu - an alcoholic drink brewed from rice - which eventually damaged his liver.