Happy CNY to one and all, well wishes to all. Good Health, Luck and Prosperity. To the Chinese, the start of the lunar new year is a refreshing start and time for renewal. It is indeed a wonderful time to celebrate and usher in new times and an even better future in the year ahead.
CNY is another occasion to follow the cultures and traditions of the chinese to bring good luck and happiness for the year. We do the normal stuff like visiting relatives and friends (whom we mostly don’t during the course of the year), having reunion meals and eating symbolic food, and of course, collecting money-full red packets for good luck. In Singapore, we get 2 public holidays in order to do all the above. In China, it’s 15 days, mainly because there will be a mad migration within the country during this period for families rushing back to their homes. Whatever it is, CNY is suppose to be a super happy occasion for all.
I treasure the experiences and meaning that CNY brings into our lives but during these few years, I feel especially empty during this period of the year. Certain things that hold meaning feel meaningless. Sometimes, I feel as though I am just going through the motion of it all for the sake of tradition. Don’t get me wrong, it’s not that I don’t enjoy CNY, it’s just that I love to question things and derive meaning from them. A few of them made me feel empty. A few questions about CNY popped up in my mind and I find myself thinking too much but essentially, maybe I was just being too practical. Take a few examples below…
1. Ang Bao Dilemma
What do kids do when they get their red packets full of money? Most of them keep it, some don’t. The more filial ones will voluntarily give it back to their parents, whilst others are “forced” to give them back. Those who keep them, what do they do with them? I used to keep the money and buy some toys during the course of the year, should have bought books instead =X. Most kids do the same I guess, unless they are guided by their teachers or parents to at least save up for the future. To those who give them back to their parents, kudos to you because at least you have lighten to load of the output ang bao money of your parents. For those who are “forced” to give them back, I am sorry for you because you don’t have a choice and all I can say is that your parents are rather nasty. Well my take is on this is that the Ang Baos are given for symbolic good luck and the kids ought to have the freedom to use their money at their own discretion. They ought to be guided on how to spend this money or even invest it, but still, it should be up to the kid to decide. Tradition such as these do need to have practicality and courtesy.
2. The Political Visits
Visiting, a chore to some, great happiness to many. I think it’s the elders that are most happy when they have visitors during CNY. There is this air or respect and pride amongst them as they see people whom they occasionally see or not see at all come and wish them good luck and good health for the year ahead. It’s true that for the kids, the things that they look forward to is the ang baos and playing with their cousins or friends, thus they have simple minded happiness that they derive from the visits. Those that are in between the elders and kids, the young adults or even adults don’t really have much to look forward to during such visits. I am currently caught in that phase and have started to feel the effects of visits being a chore. You visit a house, sit inside, talk a bit to your relatives, sit aside and wait for your parents to finish talking and decide to leave, sounds mundane right? Not only is it a chore, it’s a political issue among the family as well. For example, when your family visits another, your aunts and uncles will definitely ask about your progress in life amongst other things that they would find interesting. Then they will compare it to their own children’s progress. If you do well in life or studies, it reflects well on your parents, if you don’t it doesn’t. This is the added pressure of CNY visitings and I am sure a lot of my peers are very familiar with such scenarios and sort of dislike them. Especially those with bigger families. Not all families are like that though, thank god mine isn’t and I like it to remain that way.
Despite saying the above, I still enjoy CNY on the whole. However, I think it is important to bring such issues up because we live through them and there are ways to make experiences better, especially celebrations. During CNY we are high strung about the pressures of visiting, preparing for the meals and other inconveniences that might come along the way of celebrating. Celebrations ought to be stress free, relaxing, happy experiences. So I hope to appeal to our generations and future, maybe we can make CNY sexy and cool. Really cool and even fun. Instead of holding it at home, maybe elsewhere like a beach front or something. Shape it up to have a different experience altogether. Include everyone by having uni-age games instead of segregating the family into young and old and mix. I think these are a few things that can be done to make CNY a livelier, more fun experience. Other Ideas anyone?
When it’s my turn to plan for CNY, I hope to make every year a lovely experience for my family and friends, something special and awesome for all to Enjoy.
Enjoy your CNY everyone. Overeat and burn it off by exercising thereafter =X.
Love,
Kelvin “Kaizen” Koh
