My duck had visited Kusu at least half a dozen times in recent memory, but this was the first time he ascended the islet's molehill of a mountain (with a monkey in hot pursuit). In the dying hours of the day, the keramat glowed a sickly yellow, from the handrails that line the steps to the shrine to the stained stones scribbled with countless numbers of scarlet hope. Syncretic ribbons of red and ochre turn the adjacent shrubbery into wishing trees of plastic and paper.
The family of the late Haji Syed Abdul Rahman is honoured by a crew of Malay gentlemen who man the peak's assembly of holy nooks and crevices. Overseen by Pak Hussain Hashim, they tend to Datok Kong and the saint's mother and sister Datok Nenek and Datok Daughter, keeping these corners spick and span. Others hawk sticks of joss to visitors of all faiths with earnest pleas of personal disclamation. The evening was stifling and this brief spurt of cultural curiosity sputtered with the humid heat of the mid-autumn night and the mental assault of invisible petitions that criss-crossed these cramped halls in the service of bodies that moved with the speed of shadows and the silent chants of frantic figures of speech in fragrant, fearsome smoke.
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