Incense

There are reasons to burn incense. The Malays burn incense to shoo away mosquitoes that fly at dusk (waktu maghrib). They smoke the entire house and compound to kill the mosquitoes. If done correctly, there should not be any mosquitoes after dark. Still, we find people dying of malaria. But that was long ago when we were British Malaya.

Malaria is non existent today in modern Malaysia. However, haemorrhaging dengue is here to stay. Many Malays have stopped burning incense at dusk today. My grandmother burned incense but I don't, even though I went to Bukit Uhud to buy my incense. I keep the incense for teaching purposes. Will burning incense kill mosquitoes?

The Indians and Chinese also burn incense.

Incense burners