Saturday, 16 February 2008
Lunar New YearY
Today marks the 10th day of the 15-day -long festive season of the Lunar New Year, also the most important festival of the Chinese.
This year's visiting was quite different. Since my sister was back with Fred, we initially thought the Toyota ALTIS was too small to fit the 5 "kids" at the back, so the 2 youngest ones took the public transport to get to our destinations. It's the first time I've ever taken this mean of transport during visiting, so it was (you can consider it as) an eye-opener? There're actually families, i mean large families of 5 to 15 which I believe have been doing this for probably since the use of public transport. It's really cool. They're helping to reduce the amount of energy used as well!
We eventually managed to squeeze all 5 giant babies at the back seat. As my father drove on the busy roads and expressways, I realised that our family wasn't going against the traffic rules alone, many other had even more heads "popping" from the back seat!
This is how the 4 kids are supposed to be "arranged":
Big sister , Big brother , brother , me .
For the 5 families we visited, all 5 mistook us for the other us, as in the arrangement went the complete opposite way.
This was the mistaken arrangement:
me , brother , Big brother , Big sister .
Even at the dinner with my maternal relatives.
So many uncles and aunts and cousins got us mixed up! Come on, do I look older than my sister? I'm just slightly taller and chubbier than her!
Well, it was funny because many shook my hands and asked about how's life; they only speak to the adults like this, they never really bother about the youngest, probably assuming that I still have a long way to go so there's nothing much to worry about.
Oh, the 'cousins-gang' had upgraded! We used to play with those firecrackers until we were primary school kids, then we upgraded to playing self-initiated games like frisbee, soccer, captain's ball and poker cards, and this year we'd promoted to playing mahjong. Time kinduf passed much quicker than the previous years that night. The older cousins weren't really in the 'cousins-gang' thgy, they were chatting with the older generation. Okay, once we reach a certain age, we'll probably be having a Han's parliament on the first night of Lunar New Year annually...lol
Anyway, I realised that my family missed the 2 big events we would usually go each year, the Ang Pao Villa and Chingay Parade. It's kinduf disappointing, but I doubt I've the time either. Let's see how it'll go about next year.
This year's food was good. I'm lucky to have my braces on and weak gums hurting or I'd have gained more than 2kg during the festive season. It's quite a pity at the same time. Contradicting, eh?
My sister had headed back to LA yesterday, so the house is back to it's usual, quiet norm. Like almost all Chinese families in the Mainland, I guess we Singaporean Chinese also practises the "reunion -- a once-a-year opportunity to get together". This scenario will be more obvious maybe in 2 to 3 years time when my sister will still be in the States, my Big brother will still be staying at the University, and my other brother will be serving the nation.
The house was for 6 people, then to 5, reduced to 4, eventually 3.
Every reunion dinner is treasured, especially when everybody sits around the round-table with the gargling hot steamboat in the centre bringing us warmth and keeping us full.