![]() ![]() ![]() The story of The Ghost Bride has two settings – one is the real-world setting of Malacca, Malaysia in 1893 and the second is the Afterlife and the Plains of the Dead. Growing up, I was dying to ask one question – if we burn a paper car here, will it be an actual car over in the Afterlife or would it be still made of paper? Yangsze Choo’s debut The Ghost Bride (2013) answers that question and she builds a fascinating hinterland that has its own rules, logic and physics, peopled by ghosts, spirits and half-lives. Someone, I can’t remember who, told me the stuff that were burnt would “reach” my grandfather in the Afterlife. I remember the heat was so unbearable that I had to step back and shield my face, but yet I couldn’t stop looking. Rather than feeling sad, I was more fascinated by all the unusual funereal customs – the chanting, the burning of a paper mansion, paper servant effigies and even an actual sized car made of paper (these days there are even paper iPads and iPhones). My earliest memories of attending a Taoist funeral was my grandfather’s. ![]()
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