Lunisolar New Year.

Call it Chinese New Year, Lunar New Year or Spring Festival. It's referring to the same day as this day is celebrated by so many culture. To call it Chinese is a little too specific. I prefer to call it the Lunisolar New Year, because really, the calendar is based on the moon phase and solar years. Here's my 9 days of long celebration.

Saturday

Doing my annual Spring cleaning. Funny how we call it Spring cleaning when there's really no Spring in Singapore at all. It's therapeutic to throw a lot of old and useless stuff. As I go thru my stuff, I wonder what prompted me to keep these stuff in the past. The only thing that I would keep is personal cards written to me. Hopefully they'll be with me till the day I die. Then my children and grandchildren can have a glimpse of who I was when I am younger. I think I need a bigger box. The current one is almost overflowing with cards.

Reunion Dinner

This year, it's me and Mom and Dad. All my sisters are married (Jasmine being the most recent) and have their own reunion dinner with their husband's family. I am not so good at creating atmosphere over the table. At times like this, I wish my sisters are around to make noise around the table. Maybe next year I can organise a steamboat dinner and invite my sisters and brother-in-law back to have a noisy dinner together.

Late nite communion at Eric's

Since the 1st day of CNY is on a Sunday, church has decided to conduct services in the homes, and the time and day to be determine by the groups themselves. We took communion after a sharing from Eric.

1 day of New Year

Lots of house visiting with my relatives.

Dinner at the Loo's

2 day of New Year

More house visiting.

I decided to open up my house and invited friends over for steamboat dinner. Steamboat dinner was quite a success because we manage to finish up all the food.

After dinner, the house was reconfigure for Mahjong and other games. I was playing BANG! At about 12 midnight, some of them decided to leave. There were 5 brothers who stayed. And we played BANG!! till 330am.

3rd day of New Year.

Slept in till 12pm. Today is gathering at my sisters place. THis year, the centre of attraction is Charmaine and Louis newborn baby girl Zhuo Xun. Sharon is in Melaka celebrating her own birthday with her family, so she miss out this year's sibling gather. After Charmaine and Louis, we hopped over to Jocelyn and Kim place where the mahjong game starts. I took over Kim for a few games. Luck was coming my way, I won Wu Tai Zi Mo (max win). That was exciting.

Secondary School Classmate gathering.

Yishun initiated a gathering this year. Since she is a mother of 1 girl and due for delivery in a few month, I suggest to gather at her place. I was a small gathering but it was good. I haven't seen some of them for a decade. I had a great time reconnecting with my good old pal especially Guohui and Fucai. He didn't change a bit!! Scary isn't it, come to think of it. Well, he made the same comment about me too. But I don't think that is totally true. I know I look alot more mature now.

4th Day of New Year

Today is Daddy's day. I spend the morning checking out the newly open Dairy Farm Nature Reserve with dad. It is connected to the Bukit Timah Nature Reserve. That's my favourite way to get time with dad.

Dad grew up in a Kampong so he is very familiar with flora. He can recognise a lot of them. If you walk along parts of the nature reserve especially on the cycling trails leading to the rock climbing cliff, most of the flora you see are "kampong" vegetation. Dad said most of these are planted by previous residence. Meaning to say that the trails were previously part of a Kampong.

I think I can recognise tapioca and rubber tree. I also know how to spot the leaves use from wrapping rice dumpling.

On the ride home, we were talking about the concept of currency exchange. I remember when I first learn about the difference in currency, I was quite clueless. Why is it that my 1 SGD when use in China becomes 5Yuan. One more amazing fact I learn from dad about Sing Dollar and Malaysia Ringgit. Do you know that as late at 1986, the exchange rate from SGD to RM is 1 for 1? I thought there was a disparity soon after Singapore gain independence and produce her own currency.That was only 24 years ago. Imagine someone who parked 100,000 SGD in Malaysia can now withdrawn 240,000RM. Check that out.

Another trivial here. Sing Dollar and Brunei Dollar is interchangeable.

Fifth Day of New Year

Slept in again. Then went to pick up bus ticket from Transnasional offiice on Lavender St. Spent a lot of time packing my stuff. Later on, met up with Zach and Victor to depart for our trekking trip to Berkelah Waterfall.

Christmas long weekend

Keeping awake throughout the night has not been my favorite thing. In fact, the main factor why I don’t like working in the maintenance industry is that I have to work shift, which would also translate to working past midnight and sometimes as late as crawling into my bed at 4am.

Over the Christmas holiday, I surprised myself by staying awake on the 24th and 25th of Dec. It wasn’t by circumstance, but rather it was by choice. Maybe I was trying to convince myself that though I am past 30, I could still do the things I used to do 10 years ago?

I was invited by my good brother Zach to join him for Christmas Countdown Party at Sentosa Tanjong Beach. And I was informed that the party would carry on till the morning of 25th Dec.

On the 24th of Dec, I rang up FJ and Dionne hoping to get some time with them as they had left for honeymoon on the 11th. To my surprise, they are going to the countdown party too. To top it of, they are bringing almost all their trekking gears as they plan to camp overnight at the beach. Now, there is really no way I can find an excuse not to be there. I was rather glad that they are going, and so we drive to Sentosa in my sister’s car.

We were the first few to get there. I put on my running gears and went for a run along the beach. FJ went for a swim in the sea. Dionne found 2 coconut trees to tie my hammock for a nap. I joined FJ for the swim after I did 30 mins of run.

The sun has set but the food are not here yet, we were getting hungry. We need the food to arrive soon or we need some good distraction or resort to cannibalization.

Caroling by the beach
Gigi turned on her singing talent and lead some of us in Christmas Caroling. I suspected we have created history by staging the best ever outdoor Christmas caroling since the time of Pulau Blakang Mati (as Sentosa is previously known.) The singing was in pitch-perfect 4-parts harmony, as the professional singer belted out the tune without any reservation. Gigi does her wonder by her jazz interpretation of Let It Snow, complete with synchronized moves.

Not to mention that the performance was enhanced by technology. Instead of having song sheets, we have the words on iPhone. As we could access the Internet via iPhone, we can take song dedication from the audience. Gigi read out the words for us. We make sure that no paper is wasted in printing of song sheets.

When it comes to 12 Days of Christmas, Gigi lead the audience to participant in the singing. At the climax, the food and the rest of the gang showed up, and so the singing stops naturally.

Dinner was prepared with love by Jennifer and Samantha. Great job girls!!! Dinner was great, but my very Asian tongue was craving for Bee Hoon and Chicken wings. So pardon me for not raving about the food.

The rest of the night were filled with activities- photo taking, light stix fashion competition, sparklers, card games, cycling, toilet visiting and more.

By 4am, I have to sleep. I grabbed my hammock and chose 2 coconut trees near the beach and a distance from the group. It was a great spot on the beach. It was an almost cloudless night. I put on my shirt after 5mins; the land breeze was quite chilly. Luckily, I have my fleece jacket with me; I almost left it in the car.

So deep in sleep was I that Justin had to wake in up at 0730hrs. The glaring sun shocked me for a moment. What a wonderful feeling to wake up to the sun, sand and sea on the Christmas morning.

25th Dec
1500hrs- Drove to Macritchie for a run. Met up with Hancong for dinner before heading to church for Christmas service. This is the first time in my life that I’m attending service on Christmas day.

After service, we head down to Upp Thomson for supper. That’s not the end of the program for the day. I’ve invited brothers over to my place for a night of BANG!!! Bernard, Hancong and Zach are with me. Victor, Kong Hong and Jeffrey will be meeting us at my place.

We had a show and tell session. I receive a new shirt from a sister. It fits well on me. FJ and Dionne gave Zach a very interesting T-shirt from Japan that has a Sumo wrestler on it. There were plenty of snacks to go around while we play BANG!!! Victor brought some corns for popping. A few mins in the microwave and BING!! We have butter coated popcorn fresh from the microwave.

BANG!!!
I’ve mention about BANG!! on a few occasion, but do you know what is it about? OK. It’s a card game set in the wild wild west and all the players are cowboys. Sheriff keeps the town safe, his deputy supports him. The outlaws are there to create havoc and to kill the Sheriff and his deputy. Lastly, the renegade wants everyone dead, but with a catch. He has to kill the Sheriff himself (and all the other players are dead). All players’ identities are kept secret, except for the Sheriff himself. However during the game, you can claim to be anyone. You identity will be revealed when another player kills you.

Being in the company of brothers and good friend is a great feeling. We were doing what we like to do as men- competing with each other. Sometimes the atmosphere can be quite tensed. In one of the game, I was the renegade, all Outlaw were dead. I was trying to win the trust of Sheriff Bernard by acting as a deputy, at the same time casting one of the real deputies as the renegade. Everyone started to doubt each other, I have to play the mind game and play my cards right. At one point I was the suspected renegade, then the tide turn and deputy Victor starts to shoot deputy Zach. Deputy Zach retaliated. I’ve won over the trust of Deputy Zach. Deputy Victor is unsure, he was alternating his attacks Deputy Zach and I(which further cast him as the desperate renegade trying to keep himself alive). Finally, deputy victor made his last bet amidst of all this confusion. You can tell by the look of his face that he is in agony over who to believe. I got killed and the game ended. But boy, it was so tensed! I almost took out my real pistol from my room. (ok, I don’t have one. Just joking)

Once the game was over, we were back to friends again. No hard feelings. Though we enjoy the moment when we were competing and killing each other.

We got hungry and went to the 24-hrs McDonald’s beside Admiralty MRT. We chatted for a while over drinks and nuggets. It wasn’t long before the excitement of the game calls us back for more killing. By 0600hr, the shooting spree is over and the brothers left for their home by train.

26th Dec
0700hrs. it was actually 1 hour ago that I lay down my head on my pillow. I have to get out of my bed. I’ve arranged to meet Charles at Bishan MRT to bring him to Macritchie Reservoir for our regular Sat morning run. Raymond was supposed to be there but he didn’t show up.

At noon, I finally got back home for some rest.

1700hrs. I was awake but not sure what to do. Mom wants a ride to dinner and so I agree. Today is Jasmine’s (my younger sis) birthday and I wrote her a card. Since she’ll be with Dave at the bicycle shop, I went over to see their newly opened bicycle shop just across the road from Sembawang MRT (HDB office). Business was good on that Sat evening. I’m happy for them.

Jocelyn and Kim dropped by around 8pm and we went to the nearby coffeeshop for dinner.

I think I am overdosed from activities over the weekend. I'm planning to bring it down a few notches over the New Year weekend.