"Smoking-gui," "gambling-gui," "womanizing-gui," "drinking-gui," "filthy-gui," and "nuisance-gui." "Petty-gui," "stingy-gui," "selfish-gui," "suspicious-gui," "immoral-gui," and "cowardly-gui." Gui-the Chinese term for a variety of ghosts, spirits and demons-are everywhere to be found in the Chinese language, more so among the living than even among the dead.

In Mandarin they say: someone who always has a cigarette in his mouth is a "smoking-gui;" someone with a taste for the bottle is a "drinking-gui;" someone who is never far from the card table is a "gambling-gui;" and someone steeped in the pleasures of women and song is a "dirty-gui." In Taiwanese, a glutton is a "hungry-gui," someone stingy is a "miserly-gui," a groper is a "womanizing- gui," and someone untidy is a "filthy-gui."

Dear reader! No matter what your vice is, there is a gui named for it. Everyone has a gui of some sort inside.

Here a gui, there a gui

There are gui outdoors, and gui inside the home too. Your better half is both a "dozy-gui" and a "stingy-gui." Your sweet little poppet is also a "crying-gui," while a mischievous child is a "naughty-gui." That "stingy-gui" next door is as eccentric as a gui, as scheming as a gui, and as spiteful as a gui. When a "puffed-up-gui"-a bragger- announces dramatically how he "ran into a gui in broad daylight," all I see is "a Taoist priest summoning up gui"-someone trying to frighten with a display of bluster.

They say that when you have money you can even get a gui to work a millstone, but if on the other hand, you tell a "lazy-gui" to do something, then it's like "asking a gui to treat the sick," or "ushering a gui into your abode," in which case the more they help the busier you end up. Sincerity is important in business, and being "furtive like a gui" or "deceitful like a gui" will only hold you back. As they say: "the wails of man and gui are quite different," so that we can distinguish between good people and bad. You particularly want to avoid the high-interest loan offered by a "bloodsucker-gui," because he bodes ill, like a "wronged gui offering New Year's greetings." Once the whole family has been sucked dry, though "neither god nor gui knew how," you only have yourself to blame for "shunning people, but sneaking off with a gui."

When it comes to malicious, scheming types, we always invoke the name of gui. What is a gui? It's actually a "poor-gui," a "wronged-gui," and a "scapegoat-gui."

Cheating-gui?

People are afraid of "dead-gui," but in today's troubled world, they are even more afraid of "living-gui." When a "living-gui" encounters a "dead-gui," which do you think is more afraid?

During the Jin dynasty, over 1500 years ago, a man called Song Dingbo met a gui on the road one night. The gui said: "I'm a gui, who are you?" Song promptly replied: "I'm a gui too." The two "gui" then went on their way together towards town.

After a few kilometers the gui said: "Walking is too slow-let's take turns carrying each other." The gui carried Song for a few kilometers, and began to wonder why he was so heavy. "Are you really a gui?" he asked suspiciously, to which Song replied: "I'm a new gui, so my body is still heavy!" They swapped over, and sure enough the gui was very light.

Riding comfortably on the back of the gui, Song asked: "Big brother, I only just died so I don't know much. What do gui have to avoid most of all?" The gui said: "People spitting is what we fear most." When they arrived at the market, Song spat all over the gui, who turned into a goat. Song sold the goat for 1,500 cash, and soon everyone knew his story.

Many centuries later, during the Qing dynasty, there was a lazy man called Jiang Sanmang, who heard the story of Song Dingbo and conceived a crafty little plan. Every day he went to the graveyard carrying a stick and a rope, and waited to snare himself a gui, which he intended to sell to fund his drinking. He tried for a whole month before giving up, empty-handed. Even today, however, there are still those who make their living out of "pretending to rouse the gui."

Scheming gui

Most people are afraid of gui, but not everyone. Pu Sungling, an expert on gui stories, told of a youth called Geng Quping, who heard about a haunted house with a front door that opened and shut by itself, and mysterious sounds of laughter and singing. Taking along his bed mat and books, Geng went to study in the haunted house.

Sure enough, a gui appeared in the middle of the night, staring at Geng, with dishevelled hair and a face as black as lacquer. Smearing ink on his face to make himself black too, Geng laughed at the gui until it slipped away, embarrassed.

Another tale of a gui that failed to frighten is told by the Qing dynasty scholar Ji Xiaolan in his work Notes from Straw Hall. A student called Cao was spending the night at a friend's house, staying in a haunted study. During the night, something resembling a sheet of paper slipped in under the door, then turned into a female gui.

The gui took on the appearance of a hanged woman, with her hair hanging loose and her tongue sticking out. Cao chuckled at the apparition and said: "Your hair may be a little messy, but it's still hair, and while your tongue may be on the long side, it's still a tongue. What's so scary about that?" Piqued by his reaction, the gui removed her head and tossed it onto the table. "You're not frightening with your head on," scoffed Cao, "let alone without it!" Having exhausted her bag of tricks, the gui vanished.

Not long after, Cao again had occasion to sleep over in his friend's study. Just as before, the female gui slipped in under the door during the dead of night, but as soon as she saw Cao she exclaimed: "Drat! It's that boring killjoy again," and slipped back out.

Gui look down on us

The Qing dynasty painter Luo Pin had blue eyes, and was the youngest of the "Eight Eccentrics of Yangzhou." He claimed that with his blue eyes he was able to see gui, and he painted a well-known work entitled "Intriguing Gui."

According to Luo Pin, spectres were forever flitting around, both in the city and at home. When a gui encounters someone with wealth and authority, it slinks along the wall, but when it finds someone poor and lowly it attaches itself to his back, and plays a million tricks on him.

Little "goblin" gui are particularly vexing, and very practical with it. A man was on his deathbed, when his spirit began to leave his body, led by an escort to the nether world. Grotesque gui were all around. One of the gui "Looked like a human, but had no mouth below his nose." The man's spirit asked why, to which the escort replied: "When he was alive he continually flattered and fawned on others. This is his punishment - he cannot talk now." Another gui was crawling along with its rear end in the air, its head bent down, and its face growing on its stomach. The escort explained: "This is his punishment for being vain and arrogant during his life. Now he can never again be haughty." There was another gui in an even worse condition: its abdomen was sliced open from the chest down, revealing hollow space where its organs should have been. "That fellow," said the messenger, "was a vicious schemer. Now he will never again have a bellyful of evil ideas."

In the book Records of Gui by Zhong Sicheng, the author remarks in his preface that "the life of humans is of this world; we only know that the dead become gui, and not that the living can also be gui."

What is a gui? In Buddhism, hosts of "hungry gui" are often driven out by the Gui King, scattering in every direction. They are constantly afraid, even of humans. One kind of gui has an enormous belly and is always hungry, but can barely swallow because its throat is only as wide as a pin hole. When food does reach its stomach, it turns into a raging fire.

Do you ever feel uneasy, panicky, pushed around by others? Filled with desires, yet also anxious and worried, with no appetite? Does that sound at all familiar? In this "living hell" that we inhabit, our gui are always with us. Dear reader, do you still ask: What is a gui? Where are the gui?