I grew up in Hong Kong at a time when amahs( servants) were commonplace in most households. We had an amah who cooked, an amah who did the laundry and ironing, an amah who looked after the children. My Amah was a middle-aged lady who lost her daughter several years before she found work at our house. She was a simple woman, quiet, stoic except when she talked about her little girl. In a fervent and unforgettable voice, she would speak as though the girl were still alive, insisting that the dead girl had visited her several times at night and had even touched my forehead ( when I was fast asleep). I loved listening to Amah when she went on these ramblings; they pointed to something so close and yet so strange.

But my Grandmother worried that Amah might be poisoning my mind.