Travel,  Uncategorized

What is the meaning behind Chinese New Year?

March 1, 2014

Hello readers!!

Today I am going to share with you what Chinese New Year meant to me.

Chinese New Year last for 15 days in total. Usually falls between End of Jan to Mid Feb of the English Calendar. You can also say that the Chinese Calendar is slower by a month or two compared to the English Calendar.

1) Why is it so? Reason being is that Chinese Calendar might have this term called “Double Month”.
What is double month? Common example of Double month is some years in the Chinese Calendar they have “Repeat May” meaning, Jan, Feb, Mar, Apr, May, May, June, July, Aug, Sep, Oct, Nov, Dec. So instead of having 12mths, they have two May therefore there is 13mths in total.
*This have no relation on AWS / 13 Month Bonus.*
After a while of this Repeatitious month happening, definitely the Chinese Calender will somehow “Lag” behind.  

2) Why is there Chinese New Year?
During olden days, there is this Monster called “Nian” (In English, Year) So Nian is a monster which kidnaps little children and then the children in the village will disappear.
So parents in the village wanted to chase Nian Monster away, they release Firecracker and fireworks to actually scare Nian away.
After scaring Nian away, there is no more cases of children being kidnapped.
There for the Chinese called “Guo Nian” which means New Year/ New Beginning.
Guo means: Passover, past, overcome
Nian means: Year / monster “name”
Guo Nian means: Overcoming Monster
*This story is hearsay from Chinese Folktale story book.*
The above mentioned is all hearsay from relatives and friends. You may have your version and you can just share & comment below.  

3) To Ger’z World, what is Chinese New year?
It is to COLLECT Angbao / Red Packet. So to celebrate the New Year, Married Adults and Elderly would give little kids Red Packet. What is inside a red packet? Usually is Notes, Money, Chocolate and blessing items. Most commonly seen is a SGD$2 Purple Note. 

Other than to collect red packets, it is a great time to meet relatives and friends. Usually we will get to meet distant relatives. In Singapore, not all family get to gather (together) every weekends or have BBQ parties now & then. We usually meet relatives once in a year (during Chinese New year) as we are all busy with our own schedule and also other commitments we may have.  

To some families, Chinese New Year is a time for gambling. They played poker, Blackjack, Baccarat and other card games to win money. Most of them treat it as a bonding session. Usually the adults will play with the kids and will somehow let the Kids win some money to make them happy. I have seen two real-life scenarios of Adult & Kids Gambling Session.  

1) I have got an ex-colleague Douglas, and I remember he once told me during Chinese New Year, he was gambling Blackjack with his little nephew. His Nephew is about Primary School (7-10years old) and he was quite addicted to gambling and could not stop himself. So what Douglas did was to make little Nephew lose all his money and also taught him that “One Should not be upset over winning or losing of game and being so engrossed in gambling is not going to do you any good.” I believe little nephew will definitely learn his lesson (thru the hard way I suppose) 

2) Every Chinese New Year I will have this family uncle that will visit my gramps and he is like the “God of Fortune”. God of Fortune usually will bring us money and good luck and he is basically like a God of Fortune for the Kids. He will always win the Adults money and then give money to the Kids. He does not just simply give money away. He will play with the kids and he will lose his money on purpose. He is definitely an nice guy but somehow I don’t agree with his action. Kids might think that Gambling is an easy way to earn money and will get addicted to it. But even it is addiction, it is just during the month of Chinese New Year. 

So how did I spent my Chinese New Year this 2014?

 So usually, at the EVE of Chinese new year, every Chinese family will their own reunion dinner so us! We first had dinner with Casper’s Family & then go Mum’s house for Lohei and Countdown!
What is Lohei? Lohei is a tradition from Singapore/Malaysia, you basically mix all the fresh ingredient / raw ingredients together and you will have everyone surrounding the table and holding a chopstick and you will “flip” the ingredients. While doing this, you are suppose to say Auspicious things. E.g Prosperous New Year, Happy Marriage, etc. 
 For Chinese New Year, as the name says, we are suppose to have everything Brand New. 
Brand new clothes, Brand new shoes, brand new Bags.
 Also you will need to send out greetings! 
Left: Drawn by Jeslyn (6yrs old) my God-Sister.
Right: Typed by Wenxi
 During Chinese New Year, you will receive Red Packets. This year, we received a lot of Minion theme red packets from relatives. As a Fan of minions and despicable me, we are obviously more delighted to see the Minions Packet. 
 I also get to visit my second grand-aunt staying at Choa Chu Kang. 
This is Baby Oliver, 9mths old. 
Baby of Eileen Mummy & James Daddy.
My god-parents. 
 At late night, I went to visit Mum’s God-mother which is my God-grandmother. 
The best thing about going to God-grandmother house is that I get to see Jeslyn (HuiLing). 
She is so cute. Love the way she always pose herself infront of the camera. 
I am also glad to have her as my Flower girl in banquet. 
 2nd Day of Chinese New Year, we will visit the temple with Casper’s Relatives. 
This is a selfie taken with Yongxin, Casper’s Niece. 
She is a very talented girl, currently she is schooling in School Of The Arts.
After which, we went over to Malaysia , Nursajaya to visit Great Grandmother & God-parents. 
They just bought a semi-detached there and they were having their house warming. 
A photo with great-grandma 
Realise both of us look alike.  
 With such nice grass carpeted flooring, how can we not take some photos? 
God-parents really spent a lot on Interior Designing. 
 If you are in Malaysia, do what you can do in Malaysia!
Obviously we can’t let off Firecrackers at home or setting fireworks. 
It is against the Law. So we shall do this in Malaysia.
Photo grabbed from: Cousin Erilea Instagram
 The main highlights of this house warming is that my God-mother actually arrange Loklok.
What is Loklok? It is like a skewer and you will have different trays placing different skewer. Then you just grab whatever food you like and there will be this uncle to help you prepare your food. 
The color coding at the end of the sticks is to differentiate the price of each Skewer. 
You can prepare the Skewer / Loklok in 2 different way.
1) Uncle will help you BBQ
2) Boil it yourself
Many of us choose Option 1. As you can see, the is the long queue of food. 
Apparently and sad to say, I am the last tray at the most right. 
The time is 6.45pm but my food is only ready at 8pm. By that time I was really hungry and I technically gobbled down all the food without chewing. 

Mini review on Loklok Catering

Advantage:

1) Bring you back to the 80s

2) Feel Nostalgic

3) Choose food you like

4) Good for the small appetite people

Disadvantage: 
1) Housefly can fly around and contaminate the food. 
2) Inconsiderate people will grab all the food without thinking for the others.
3) The queue is too long as there is a lack of manpower in cooking.
4) Some people just dip there skewer into the “public” sauce and after they had one bite, 
they dip into it again.  
The last programme before we head back to Singapore.
We get to draw on the Lanterns and release it for blessings.
 So the is the 2nd Chinese Year Spent with Casper :) 

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