A student whose last name was Chiang had moved into a new home, a beautiful villa built on a hillside.

One night, while asleep, he suddenly heard a great deal of noise. After waking, he found nothing unusual. So he went back to sleep, only to be reawakened by the noises. This happened several more times. Then, he heard the sounds of objects being moved and tossed around, horses neighing and dogs barking, voices shouting, and numerous other loud noises.

Did his wife hear anything? Usually his wife fell sound asleep as soon as she climbed into bed, but even she had been awakened by the inexplicable noises.

When Chiang asked his only daughter about these strange noises, she told him that one night, after going to bed really late, she heard people talking outside her window. When she paid closer attention, she heard the following conversation.

"How much is the highest grade of pork?"

"Thirty copper coins."

"Can you sell it for less?"

"For an old customer, I will let you have it for twenty-eight!"

When she went to open her windows and looked outside, the street was empty under the pale lamplights. Closing the windows hurriedly, she thought to herself how strange it was. Clearly no one was out there, but she had heard all these voices. She decided she must have imagined the whole thing.

Then, another night, she heard outside her windows the quacking sound of ducks, as if someone was driving a group of ducks along the streets. Apart from the quacking sound, there was also the sound of wings flapping. It was already quite late at night, how could anyone be taking their ducks out for a walk?

The most unusual things were yet to come. One night, she decided to stay up till morning to study for an examination. Between 2:00 a.m. and 3:00 a.m., she suddenly felt the light in her room dimming and the converging of a throng of people around her. Although she remained still, she could feel her body rocking. There was no one in sight, but she felt the presence of many people in her room. Something even climbed up into her bed. Soon she smelled an aroma, the distinctive aroma of almond tea, and she heard the sound of cups and bowls knocking against each other.

The voice of an old man said, "Try to keep it down, she has an exam to take tomorrow."

"I can't help it."

"If you can't, then let's sell the tea somewhere else!"

Later, she heard the rumbling of cart wheels going away. Finally everything returned to quietness. It was as if she had been dreaming and none of those sounds had really occurred.

Chiang's wife had a cousin who was a professional chi-tung [medium], so they decided to consult with a chi-tung. Inside the small shrine room of the chi-tung, offerings of fresh fruits, wines, vegetarian and meat dishes had been set up, and a large candle was lit. An assistant of the chi-tung started beating a drum to invite the gods to descend.

The chi-tung was wearing a pair of short pants over an undergarment covering the chest and abdomen. With one knee bent, he had to be supported by two men, one at each side, who were holding his arms.

The drummer beat the drum in a powerful rhythm while singing the incantations.

After a while, the chi-tung started trembling and his body started contorting into various poses. With eyes looking sideways, he started staggering like a drunkard. One hand was fanning an invisible fan while the other brought an invisible bottle to his mouth. Then with his neck extended, he sprang up and down. Out of his lips came words, some of them in a staccato fashion, that sounded like songs or prayers at ancient sacrificial rites.

The people surrounding him let out a loud cry, "Chi-kung is here!" The drum beating immediately came to a stop.

Chi-kung first took a bite at a chicken drumstick, then took a sip of wine, and soon three drumsticks and half a bottle of wine were gone. When it looked like he had quite satisfied himself, he stuck the invisible fan behind his back, and began to take questions from the people.

Standing seriously and orderly, with papers in hand and not daring to exchange a single word among themselves, people waited respectfully for their turn to ask their questions.

Chi-kung loudly gave his answers to everyone, clearly displaying feelings of approval or displeasure on his face. As Chi-kung was not a punctilious person, any kind of trivia could be posed to him. Some people addressed him as "Chi-kung," some called him "Crazy Chi," while others called him "Buddha Chi."

When it was the turn of Chiang and his wife, Chi-kung looked at them and spoke, "Congratulations for moving into your new house. Why didn't you invite me to your house for a drink?"

"I shall, I shall, " Chiang answered deferentially.

"What has brought you here today?"

"There is something weird about the new house."

Chi-kung said, "Let me take a look." With his neck craning, Chi-kung raised a hand to above his eyebrows and started looking far off into the distance.

After a while, he seemed to have come back.

Chi-kung said, "Your house is in the middle of a ghost market."

"What is a ghost market?"

"A place where the ghosts converge to trade. They have a small fair every three days and a large one every seven days, just like the kind of fairs people have in the living world."

"Oh! Then we are finished!" Chiang sighed. "What shall we do? Living Buddha Chi-kung, you must think of a way to help us."

Chi-kung answered, "I can do nothing about it!"

A man from the surrounding crowd spoke up. "Living Buddha Chi-kung is a Lohan [Arhat] with great power. How is it that you can't do anything about it?"

"It is true that I am a Lohan, but even a Lohan has to be reasonable. Ghost realms exist in the human world, and the humans are poking their noses into them. The ghosts were there first, and the humans came later. If the latter want to overturn the ghost market, what kind of karma would that create?"

When the people around heard this, they felt it made sense.

At this moment, Chi-kung started singing a folk song. "It is rare for one to live to a hundred years old. Take away the junior and senior years, there is not much left between which is riddled with unnecessary sadness and worries. The moon after Mid-Autumn is no longer round; flowers after the last of spring start to wither, how many seasons can one has? Why not pour oneself a drink from the golden bottle? One will never expend all money in the world or occupy every official seat. How long will power and wealth last except to bring premature gray to one's hair?"

He also sang, "There is no need to flaunt, as underlying all phenomena is nothing but one truth. An elephant's worst enemy is a tiny mouse, just as a serpent is afraid to run into a centipede. A vicious villain eventually will meet dangers, as a poor gentleman will not be poor forever. Thousands of ships have sunk to the bottom of the ocean by showing off their power to beat the winds."

Chiang implored, "Living Buddha Chi-kung, how can you just let our whole family live in the ghost market?"

"That won't happen. Let me ask you now, what kinds of disturbance have the ghosts caused you?"

Chiang thought a while and said, "Except for the noises, there has been nothing else."

"Good, these ghosts are proper ghost merchants and have not done anything bad. Now, you should go to ask Living Buddha Lian-sheng Sheng-yen Lu for help."

Chiang's wife said, "Since we have brought this problem to your attention, we don't want to trouble another master about it. Why are you turning the matter over to Sheng-yen Lu?"

Chi-kung said, "Since Sheng-yen Lu has called himself `a ghost handler,' to whom else should we turn over this matter, if not to him?"

"Is Sheng-yen Lu able to handle it?" asked other people.

"In the morn I swam across the Northern Seas and at dusk I am at Cangwu,

Inside my sleeve is the heaven and earth;

Three times I was drunk in Yueyang with no one recognizing me;

With the waves surfing I flew across Lake Dongting.

This is Lu Tung-pin's poem of getting drunk at the Yueyang Tower. The abilities of Sheng-yen Lu surpasses those of Lu Tung-pin!"

When Chiang came to see me, he told me that he had been referred by the Living Buddha Chi-kung. To return Buddha Chi's compliment, I composed the following poem for him:

Li T'ieh-kuai works magic with his Iron Staff;
Lu Tung-pin's sword art is the most outstanding;
Chungli Ch'uan wanders freely with his fan,
Chang Kuo-lo carries his mule like a phoenix feather;
Ts'ao Kuo-chiu's movements alarm all ghosts and spirits;
Lan Ts'ai-ho's basket radiates brilliant rays of light;
Ho Hsien-ku's maze traps immortals;
Han Hsiang-tzu plays the flute while giving away immortal peaches.

There are not enough words for me to show my respect for the Eight Immortals. How would I dare to compare myself to the Immortal Lu Tung-pin? It was obvious that Living Buddha Chi-kung was trying to get me involved by lavishing all that praise on me.

I also wrote Living Buddha Chi-kung this other poem:

It is clear in the mountains,
It is clear in the mountains;
Detachment from all affairs affords good cultivation;
From fleeting clouds before my eyes,
Riches tumble down
From under the cliff;
Water runs off all difficulties;
All disputes do not reach me,
All arguments cannot engage me,
The times I am excited
I sing loudly "It is clear in the mountains."

I entered into meditation to make an investigation. It turned out that around the villa was a stretch of city walls six or seven miles long. Inside the walls were houses, mills, towers, halls, and multi-storied buildings. Where Chiang's villa stood was an empty lot used by the townsfolk as a makeshift marketplace. Inside the town, there were many people coming and going. Some were standing around, and some were sitting down.

When people of the world take a look, they see an empty mountain. While, in fact, it is a ghost town with habitation and activities hardly any different from those of a human town.

When I saw that, I realized why the Elder Lohan had refused to intercede. Removing a single ghost is not hard, but how does one remove tens of thousands of ghosts? This time, Living Buddha Chi-kung has indeed given me a very difficult problem to solve.

I thought of asking Chiang to move to a new home, but that would be nearly impossible. He had used up his whole life savings to purchase this new villa and, in addition to a mortgage, he had to carry a loan. It was not an easy thing for him to contemplate. Everyone in his family had been jubilant at moving into the new house, and to ask them to move out again would be like plunging them into an ice pit. His family refused to move at all.

To ask the ghost town to relocate was also problematic, as there were the city walls, towers, houses, halls, and mills, etc..

It became a knotty problem for me. I thought of contemporary construction companies that built houses on riverbeds and hills changing water courses and earth stabilization. Blocking water courses causes floods, and insufficient maintenance and support at hillsides leads to mudslides. Many engineers think only of profits and fail to consider future hazards. All these home safety measures are important.

Also, due to escalating urbanization, many public cemeteries in once desolate areas outside cities have to be relocated to make room for more houses. The living have long invaded the territories of the dead.

When demolition of cemeteries are publicly announced, the descendents of the buried have to get busy with the relocation of their ancestors. However, some descendents have moved away or some of the buried were originally from other areas, so their bones are not claimed. There are also isolated tombs from long ago and no one knows who the descendents are. There are even a large number of buried ones who just do not have any descendents. All these abandoned bones have to be grouped and housed in a public memorial hall.

After the ground of the public cemetery is scraped flat, row upon row of apartment houses gradually come into view. The human world has stepped into the domain of the ghosts and, with the retreating of public cemeteries and the continual shrinking of their domains, the ghosts are driven out to run wild.

I once found a set of skeletons under a haunted house, which was built on land that had previously been a public cemetery. The builders had not dug very deep and the house was standing right on top of the bones. Thus ghost and humans started living together, which gave rise to all sorts of entanglements. It was quite a chilling situation, and such cases are numerous. How does one decide who is right and who is wrong?

Ghost says, "It is the humans who have invaded my home."

Man says, "This is my home."

Ghost says, "I was here first."

Man says, "I paid money for this house."

Ghost says, "It is clear that you came after me."

Man says, "I shall appeal to a higher order to have you evicted."

This kind of legal dispute between men and ghosts is becoming more prevalent in modern times.

The following episode in The Life of Padmasambhava came to my mind:

Near the border of India was a city called "Butcher City." The city got its name because the people living there were so corrupt that they all had committed numerous, serious crimes including killing, arson, rape, adultery, robbery, stealing, swindling, telling lies, taking intoxicants, and recklessness. People in the Butcher City were so vicious that they were killing each other off in order to survive. The populace was no longer human having been reduced to a group of beasts.

When Padmasambhava saw this, he knew that people of the Butcher City had long ago lost their humanity and it was no longer possible to make them listen to the Buddhadharma. At the same time, the seriousness of the crimes they were committing against each other would drag them down to the interminable hells, from which escape would be exceedingly difficult.

While lamenting for them, a supreme compassion arose inside Padmasambhava's heart. After entering into meditation to investigate, he found that there existed a karmic tie between him and the people of the city.

In a cavern in north Butcher City, Padmasambhava secretly performed a "subjugation" practice. As a result, an earthquake struck which was followed by a landslide, killing and burying more than half of the population of the city. Next, a plague descended and killed everyone remaining. Not a single person of the Butcher City was spared.

Afterwards, Padmasambhava collected all the spirits of the citizens of the Butcher City and used the Vajrayana Purification Method to completely cleanse and remove their karmic obscurations. Next he used the Vajrayana Consciousness Relocation Method to send their souls to the heavenly realms to be reborn as devas to enjoy all kinds of heavenly blessings.

In terms of Vajrayana doctrines, the actions of Padmasambhava in the Butcher City have been referred to as the employment of the most malicious methods in a most compassionate way.

I thought to myself, Padmasambhava was able to completely relocate the whole Butcher City to the realm of the devas. It exercised a great transcendental power. Do I have the ability to relocate the ghost city, move it to the peak of a mountain or to the edge of a water? Could I move it to the heavens, or to underground?

The idea of "ground escape" came to me, so I burnt a paper Fu [a magic Taoist talisman], chanted a mantra, and wrote some words on a wall. Instantly a door appeared on the wall and, after slipping through it, I found myself in the ghost realm. I had arrived inside the ghost city walls and there were, indeed, many people at the ghost market, with all kinds of tradesmen engaging in all kinds of business.

I walked around and saw a building resembling a government office. A man who appeared to be an official was just emerging from it.

The official took a look at me and surprise came to his face. "Who are you? Your whole body is covered by `yang' energy. It is obvious that you are not from around here."

"Where am I?" After being seen through, I pretended that I was confused.

"This is the `yin city' under the Eastern Mountain. So you have travelled here in your dream!"

"I guess so!"

Then I asked, "Do you know who is the head of this city?"

"I am in charge of it," replied the official.

"Is it possible for this Eastern Mountain `yin city' to be relocated to another place?" I asked.

"Ha ha!" The official laughed. "This Eastern Mountain `yin city' has been established since the time of Cheng Cheng-kung. What a funny question! Just think, can it be possible for the scenic spot of Chikanlou in the city of Tainan to be relocated to another area?"

"It was something that just popped into my head." My face turned red and I felt embarrassed.

Without saying anything more, the official went away.

I walked casually around the place and came upon a young girl selling soy drink. As there were no customers around, she invited me to have a cup of the soy drink. I knew I could not eat or drink any of their foodstuffs, because my teacher had told me (and it is a known fact to people who know how to do out-of-body travelling) that once one eats or drinks in the `yin realm,' the magic would disappear and one would stay behind in the world of the dead.

If one used the method of "water escape," one would be drowned. If it was the "ground escape" method, one would be buried alive.

I did not drink the soy milk, but I walked up to her and asked, "Do you know that an Eastern Mountain villa has been built here?"

"Oh! It was built by the people of the living world. Everyone here knows."

"What do you folks think of that?"

The young girl said, "The living and the dead are in two different realities, although their territories may overlap. We are of different psychic vibrations, and there should not have been any interferences between the two!"

"What if there is interferences?"

"Then they are vibrating at the same frequency. Just have the frequency readjusted!" The little girl was laughing so hard that she was trembling.

She added, "The world of the dead is a reality equal to the world of the living, except that we are vibrating at a different frequency. The world of the dead also has its own civilization and culture."

"I see!" I thanked her.

Afterwards, I invited Chiang and his family to my house.

"Is there a problem?" Chiang asked.

"No, just relax. I have finally found a solution."

"Well, several monks have already suggested that we move away. If we do, we would have no money left," Chiang spoke in a sad voice.

"Do not worry, I have a solution!" I said, "I want you all to readjust your vibrational frequencies."

"Readjust our frequencies?" Chiang asked. "Grand Master, can you be mistaken? Radios and televisions have frequencies, but do humans have frequencies?"

"That is right; humans have frequencies. Everyone in your family carries a little bit of the frequency of the `yin world' in you. That is why you are able to receive the sounds from the ghost town. If you have your frequencies readjusted, you will definitely be able to co-exist with them in peace."

"How is that done?"

"I will teach you a mantra of yang-energy and give you a Fu of yang energy to prepare to drink. If you chant this yang-energy mantra every day, it will definitely work." I was confident.

Subsequently, the first night they chanted the mantra, all was quiet. A week, a month, and eventually a year went by, and it has remained completely quiet. Indeed, all sounds from before have entirely vanished.

So, the encountering of ghosts has turned out to be a matter related to vibrational frequencies.

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