The Spirit Moved In First — Epoche A2
3rd August Dear Diary, The house next door to ours is finished at last. Today a small table with fruit and flowers stood in the yard, and men in white set a little wooden house on a pillar in the corner of the plot. Grandmother took me out to watch. The new family has not moved in yet. The spirit of the land moved in first. Grandmother explained it on the way home. The land had a spirit before the builders came. The new house took the spirit's place, so people build it a smaller house of its own, outside — then nobody has to share rooms with an unhappy spirit. The little house received garlands, rice, and a bottle of red Fanta with a straw. I liked the Fanta best. Spirits like red, Grandmother says. Nobody remembers exactly why. Ours is old wood, small as a birdhouse. The shopping centre near my school has one as big as a bedroom, with fresh garlands from the staff every morning. The bigger the building, the bigger the little house beside it. The uncle who set it up today chose the corner very slowly. The shadow of the big house must never fall on the small one, he said.