Worship resumes

It's been two years. After two long years of what seemed like eternity, we were able to re-open our Kongsi House for worship again today. Today's session coincided with the celebration of the birthday of our resident deity, Tai Tay Eah (大帝爷) on the 15th day of the third lunar month. The only restrictions we continued to impose were the wearing of face masks and the scanning of the MySejahtera QR code.

Tai Tay Eah has been our resident deity for a very long time; not only at our Kongsi in Penang but also in our ancestral village in Hokkien Province of China. 

When our forefathers arrived in 1805, they had brought with them some ashes from the original worship urn at the Hai Inn Tong temple there. 

That's why the main hall of our Kongsi here is also named Hai Inn Tong, in honour of the original Hai Inn Tong temple in Ow Quah Sia. Tai Tay Eah, the healing deity, takes pride of place on the main altar. The deity has temples all over Penang but the main one, the Cheng Leong Keong (清龍宮), is located in Jelutong. Click here to read what I wrote about Tai Tay Eah some eight years ago.  

Some of the trustees and committee members turned up and we were quite happy and relieved to see one another. None the worse after emerging from the lockdowns of the past two years! 

My added bonus today was to see one of my old aunts - my father's cousin - whom I had invited to share in the worship at the Kongsi when I learnt that she had just moved up from Kuala Lumpur. 

I wanted to ask her about her grandfather, who was also my great-grandfather, but her memory wasn't already up to scratch. But she did reveal to me that in the old days, one of his lines of business was stevedoring and he had two shophouses somewhere along Beach Street to hold the goods in transit. Unfortunately, there is no way to identify their locations today.