my first 3 days of CNY

ok, make it 4 days as i’m including CNY eve. this is going to be sort of like a diary account of CNY eve and the first 3 days, with lots of pictures accompanying, so be warned it will be a very long post.

CNY EVE (17 feb, saturday) – reunion dinner and mass

had reunion dinner at my brother’s place. steamboat. we started early at 5.00pm since my brother and his family wanted to leave for church at 9.00pm there were 7 of as at the reunion dinner – my brother and his wife and 2 children, and my mother and my sister.

the picture you see above is a bamboo tree at my brother’s place.

my  brother and his family left for the holy spirit cathedral- while my mother, sister and i left for the our lady of sorrows church in macalister road at 9.30pm. at the church

the entrance procession

the mass was celebrated by a jesuit priest from johor. it was mainly in mandarin.  took some photos of the mass because i was going to write to the herald (our catholic magazine). yes, i  now  write for herald when there are seme event/activities going on in our church or thereabout. so far i had 3 articles published but yet to be paid. here’s the link to the article of the mass i wrote for herald.

every year in our CNY mass, we have the commemoration of our ancestors, blessing and distribution of oranges, and distribution of angpow.

picture above shows the ancestral tablet with the other offerings. some ‘modern’ catholics were not too happy with the commemoration of ancestors ceremony, more so with the use of joss-sticks, because they felt that joss-sticks  are used by buddhists/taoist only. silly. don’t they know that joss-stick is just a form of incense – incense on a stick. nothing so religiously buddhsit at all. last year i also wrote about this ceremony and had explained a little why this was not wrong. click here to read, and also here for the explanation from the herald magazine.

DAY 1 (18 feb, sunday) – at home

on this day, i was at home the whole day. well, usually on the 1st day of CNY i don’t go anywhere but stay at home. my brother and his family came to our house to ‘pai nei every year on this day.

the picture you see above is a little basket made of angpow packets, made by my mum. my mum also made a big one, which is big enough for about10 oranges! however it is for decoration purpose only as you can’t lift (of course since it is made of paper). the basket with the 10 oranges. well… if 2 or 3 oranges, maybe you can lift it up.

last year i showed some pictures of lantern and fans made of angpow packets by my mum here.

DAY 2 (19 feb, monday) – MCA/gerakan open house – met badawi!

went to the mca/gerakan open house at pisa today. wow.l lots of food and lots or vip and VV1P around

we were there about 11.20am, lots of people were already there and tucking n the food. as with most open house, we had to queue for the food… and fight for the table. haha.

round 12 noon,the arrival of ou PM, badawi was announced.  many people, especially those armed with cameras, rushed to the entrance to want to see him. i decided to join them too. it’s difficult to get a shot of badawi since there were so many people surrounding him, some want to take pictures, many who surged forward to want to shake his hands! i don’t want to shake his hands but i want to take a shot at him. i had to hold my camera high to try to take a photo of him. well i took 4 photos but only one appeared ok (as seen below). the rest i managed to get the back of people’s heads! seemed that so many people wanted to shake his

hands and keep pushing forward while the bodyguards keep pushing the people backwards. i was also pushed along too.there were other VIPS with him too but i don’t know who’s who. some their faces look familiar but i don’t know their names. as the VIPS approached the VIP table. all of them posed for a photograph with arms linking. that was when i managed to take a shot:

we left the place 5 mins after badawi took to the mic to made a speech! can’t really hear anyway as it was noisy and the sound system not good. that was the time when badawi announced his ‘angpow’ for the people of penangities – rapid kl transport company to manage the transport system in penang, plus allocating RM50 mil for penang.

note:  the star report on this open house (plus others).

DAY 3 (20 feb, tuesday)  – i won an ipod!!

day 3 was the most fulfilling day, with lots of happenings.

morning, at 11.00am went to MP wong kam hong’s open house which was held at sunshine square.

lions at the entrance to greet the VIP.

the food here was better than the food at the mca/gerakan open house! and so was the entertainment too. i would have thought being an individual, it wouldn’t be as nice as mca/gerakan’s open house but i was wrong. food, entertainment good… and i notice too more people.

after the open house i went to meet my fellow blogger, walski. walski, who is from KL, was in penang with his wife for the CNY. he had contacted me for a meet up and of course i jumped at it. it is always nice to meet a fellow blogger and i wouldn’t miss the opportunity. walski and wife were very friendly. thanks, walski, for the company and for the drinks!

it was off to my best friend’s house after meeting walski. this friend of mine seems to be the only school friend of mine that i keep in touch with regularly. she always comes to my house on christmas day and i always goes to her house on CNY day. we are long time friend (of course as since school days!) and her family and my family had get to know each other.

my friend’s CNY decoraton on the wall of her house and the elaborate altar.
from my friend’s house, i then went to ice ice baby for the penang hokkien golden pig reunion dinner. there were about 40 people present.  i was a little uncomfortable there since i don’t know anybody except for ‘shau hu’ whom i met at one of the penang bloggers meet and who did a podcast workshop for us. i know john too (the man of the night) but only through email.

above you see is the cute name tag we had to wear. no, that name tag does not belongs to others but it was mine. you notice the name ‘kim hu bak’ (which is ‘goldfish eye’ in hokkien), right. well, that was the nickname i picked for myself! all of those present had nicknames so i have to pick one too, which i picked earlier before the meet when john asked me for one in his email.

the reason i picked ‘kim hu bak’ is well… my eyes are like that lah… like a goldfish. haha. really. it’s big and bulgling. it is not a nickname i came up with by myself though. this nickname was given to me when i was a kid. i used to travel in a bus to and fro from school and being at the same time, used to run into this same conductress who often teased me that my eyes look like a goldfish and thus called me ‘kim hu bak’.

anyway as the evening move on, i found many of the people there to be friendly and got into talking with some of them. it was a fun time indeed as most of them present were jokers! they talked so loud and laughed and laughed all the time. john at one time, went round the table interviewing each one of us (for the podcast). then later on, we were suprised when a star photographer/reporter came!

however the most surprising part was the lucky draw – where i won the 1st prize of an ipod shuffle! i never imagined i could win as i know i’m not a lucky person. i never won 1st or even 2nd, 3rd prize in any lucky draw before. there were, i think 5 or 6 prizes. after all the prizes were announced save for the 1st prize, i said to myself

"there goes my chance. see, i know i’m not lucky" but oh boy, i was shocked indeed when my name was picked as the 1st prize winner! wow! i don’t really fancy an ipod and would not want to part my money for one but to get one free, of course i am overjoy. it’s so small and cute and beside using it for storing of songs, i can use it for storing files too (like a pen-drive). this is the ipod shuffle i won:

ok, so that was about it – my first 3 days of CNY. 4th day i was back at work! so no more stories to tell. ohh… i’m gonna spend these few days ‘playing’ with my new toy! 🙂

note:   the star report on john ong’s podcast. (will update with link later when the report on the dinner was out).