The start of the new lunar year of the ox started on 26 January 2009. Yeah, a little too early for me because we don't get any public holidays till April I think.
Anyway Chinese New Year is a totally non event for me. I don't really clean house, chuck out stuff, decorate or do anything special. I only get all the goodies because I WANT TO EAT THEM! So I get macadamia nuts, pineapple tarts, macadamia cashew sugee cookies and love letters as my snack stash to keep me happy.
No need for bak-kwa because it gets so expensive that I eat it all year round except at Chinese New Year when the price goes through the roof. I don't need to show face with visitors.
There are no visitors because all would have expected HH and I to have gone home to our parents. Haha! we are hiding at home with our two dogs and 3 cats with total bliss.
I have to get red packets ready because there are those who celebrate Chinese New Year and would expect me to give out these packs to their kids. So I prepare a stack of these and hand them out freely to all the kids who appear.
We went to a friend's home for the reunion dinner - a small event with her father, aunty bee, the maid and us, just 6 people who don't really celebrate much. No "traditional" food - just simple food because she insisted that we go over.
Otherwise HH and I have had roti prata at Jalan Kayu or Kentucky Fried Chicken for our dinner as our "reunion" dinner. I shocked one Malay boy a few years ago with my excellent Malay on Chinese New Year's eve by telling him "Tiga keping ayam mesti ada satu keping sayap" translated as "3 pieces of chicken and 1 of those pieces has to be a chicken wing"! He couldn't make out whether I was Chinese or Malay because of my cheena-pek face and my excellent Malay accent!
We went over to my father's cousin's home for dinner on the first day of Chinese New Year. Aunty Florence had insisted that we go over to join in the melee of humans in her small granny flat in Bedok North. There we met my cousins, aunts and uncles and the nephews - I only see them once a year. Of course the aunts, uncles and cousins would know us, but the kids are just happily taking ang-pows from me and forgetting my "aunt" status.
Our forays out of our apartment are just for fresh air to take the doggies for walks, otherwise we spend the time at home reading, watching TV and glued to the computer to check out what is going on in the world outside.
It is a good way to relax over Chinese New Year - just relax lah.
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