Chinese New Year

As far as many kids are concerned, Chinese New Year (CNY) means only one thing - ang pows 红包. It was not much different for me.  The way I saw it was when we were young, the celebration of CNY is all about receiving ang pows. Visiting relatives? Ang pow. Playing host to friends and family at home? More Ang pows. 

      I remembered the days when my sister and I would rip open the red packet once out of sight of the adults to see whether the inside content is 'a lot' or not. Those were the days where we children would be delighted to get even RM2 and gasped when it was more than that.  

       Now that I am older, I have of course realized that CNY is not just about money. It is more about spending times with our loved ones. The joy was to sit down together during reunion dinner and on another occasion on the 14th day of the CNY (Chap Goh Meh) to lou yee sang  to wish for prosperity and future success. 

       My family has the tradition to travel back to Bekok, Johor to my paternal grandparents house on the 1st day of CNY. For your information, Bekok is situated between Labis and Chaah.If you still don't know where is it, its somewhere near Segamat. 

        Bekok is a very small town with only two rows of shop lots, one restaurant, two grocery shops, one kopitiam, one municipal hall, one basketball court, two temples and mostly papan houses (yes, I purposely count out the number of buildings they have there)

        I enjoy these trips back as I get to spend time with my relatives who lived in Singapore. The adults usually gambled and drink and the children would play firecrackers. Since it is a very isolated town (I mean it, very very isolated) there are zero risk of police catching children playing firecrackers illegally because, they themselves are gambling too. 

        There was one year whereby the house opposite put out a firework that lasted for 15 mins. It was quite a majestic display as it was so up close to us!

        The most interesting thing that we do each year during CNY is bringing in the lion dance troop into the house. Each year, there are always two or three lion dance troops that travel house to house to perform lion dance upon request. 

        The usual method is for them to 'dance' in front of the 'praying table with the statues of guan yin and other gods'. The climax of the performance is to peel mandarin oranges to be eaten by members of the household. The catch is the more oranges you want them to peel for you, the 'bigger' the ang pow that you have give them. 

         This year there is something even more 'exciting'. I saw a 财神爷 (loosely translated as a god that brings wealth)  just outside my grandmother's house, with a basket on one arm filled with pink ang pows and a handful of fake golds on the another. 

         The funny part is, this 财神爷 ask for gifts like mandarin oranges and ang pow from you in return if you were to invite him into your house for the so called blessing of fortune. The 财神爷 also give ang pows to children, me myself included. Guess what is inside the ang pow.... TOTO NUMBER, NO MONEY. Yeah, that is the so called wealth that he could bless us with.

To all who are reading this,

恭喜发财  红包拿来 

祝大家在来年的牛年身体健康财运滚滚来

Gong Xi Fa Chai Hong Bao Na Lai.

 I wish everyone good health and prosperity for the year of the Ox.