Brief Return to Port Dickson

Last weekend, my other half had a conference in Port Dickson (PD) and we had a brief 'return' to this town. I mentioned the word 'return' is that we used to live there (perhaps not many people know this) but I will return to this story at the end of this post. The conference was attended by Muslim general practitioners in order to gain points for the renewal of the annual practicing licence. Some of these conferences are (partially) sponsored but some are not.

Only my other half stayed there for a night while me and my eldest son returned home after sending her to Corus Paradise Resort on early Saturday morning. We had not been there for many years. We took the Seremban-Port Dickson highway to get there. I remembered using this highway at some point (accompanying my other half to her private clinic there and this is very much later than the time that we stayed there). That morning, it rained and we only managed to have breakfast together somewhere near Dewan Bagan Pinang.

I could no longer recognise the route we were taking (later I realised it was a different exit during the times I went there). On Sunday afternoon, we went back to PD to fetch her. This time round, the roads were busier with many people going to the beach. I remember in those days, we normally tried to avoid going there during the weekends as it will be full of people and there will be quite a traffic jam. However, this time round, I felt different and sensed some joy that businesses are being revitalised after the pandemic. We did not go to the beach of course and headed simply to the resort. My eldest son and I had our (relatively expensive) lunch as we wait for my other half to finish her conference.

We left the resort around 2pm and headed home. Before heading home, I took a photo of this abandoned mansion.

I think there are quite a few of them in this seaside town and some tend to be an eyesore. This brings me to the story when we were living briefly in PD. My other half was just transferred to the public clinic in PD and she was given a two-storey quarters near the hospital. At the time, we had our eldest son who was just a baby then. We stayed there for a week until we decided to live elsewhere. The quarters is big with plenty of rooms and there was a nice study room attached to the master bedroom. In my mind, it was like a dream house. But things turned out differently. During our stay there, we also had my late mum who was under our care since she broke her leg. At the time, I was essentially travelling to UPM from PD and back essentially daily, and it was pretty tiring.

In the quarters, there was this door attached to the verandah near the room to which my mum was placed (on the ground floor for easy access to toilet and kitchen). This door opened at specific hours  (despite being locked). Initially I thought of brushing this thing off, but it was getting strange. My son (a baby) was sent to a baby care place (essentially somebody that my other half knew) and was only on the house during the evening. At the quarters, he kept on crying throughout the night until we didn't quite have enough rest. I remembered I had two near-accident incidents, one on the way to UPM and another on the way back, simply because I got very tired. At the time, we spent most of the time downstairs to keep company my mum. Over time, we tend to sense eeriness most of the time. I remembered once of the door kept opening, I slammed the door back shut (this was right in the afternoon) and almost immediately after, there was a door being slammed upstairs. This was my real experience. I did not see anything supernatural apart from the door and the eeriness. However, my mum experienced more since she was in the house all the time (I hope she forgive me for putting her through these). So after a week there, we decided for health and safety reasons to move out from the place. We took off to Jalan Davis in KL (used to have government quarters there before they demolished them) where my sister was, and stayed there before we got a house to rent in Seremban.

I actually hesitated to tell the story above because of fear being told as being superstitious or even very weak-minded unfit to be scientist. But then my Islamic faith tells me of the unseen world that is usually hidden from us (so such poltergeist activity, if one may called that, it is really out of the norm). The Qur'an has even one surah that is entitled Al-Jinn. So I won't be ashamed of asserting of what I believe in (or apologetic) and telling the story above. The point here is not so much on highlighting the supernatural aspects (I'm aware of the dangers of crossing the superstitious boundaries like some folks do) but more of drawing lessons from this incident. I was at the time a bit arrogant and also ignorant; ignoring the advice of our elders and did not enter the house in a way suggested by Islamic norms. I was thinking that human is 'superior' and I will be able to ward off undesirable incidents by myself (for which I could not really). I have learned my lesson. But one professor told me that a stay of one week there was not enough to draw any conclusions (Huh! As if one could really do controlled experiments). I was more concerned about my baby son and mum, and of course our own health. These days, I'm less arrogant (I think). At our present home, I have made sure that each room is not left unoccupied for too long. I will try my best to conduct prayers or read Qur'an there (apart from the room of my eldest who is now staying with us and he is always there). So the main point: be humble, keep learning and practice good deeds; arrogance has no real place for muslims. May Allah always guide us and make our paths easy.