First Day Chinese New Year

Visitors, visitors and more visitors! Pleased to have visitors. They came to pay their respects on the first day of Chinese New Year.

I remember as a child in the 1930’s celebrating Chinese New Year. We were not Christians then. The first day of New Year was the climax of a pre-New Year celebration programme which started with the ‘sending off the kitchen god’ on the night of the 23rd day of the twelfth moon. We believed the kitchen god would report on us to the God of Heaven. On that night, we prayed to this god with food offerings, pastries and of course the sweet ‘ti kway’ (sweet cake)

Then there would be the spring cleaning. We all had to do our share to make sure the house was absolutely clean using brooms, brushes, old rags, soap and detergents.

We children had to do our part in making cakes. I still remember the names – kueh lapis, kueh belanda (love letters), kueh bangkit and kueh bolu etc. We would give some to our neighbours and in turn received theirs. And we would share with our Malay and Indian neighbours and when it came to Hari Raya or Deepavali they would do the same to us. We had a lovely neighbourhood in Lorong Limau - all races lived in harmony.

On New Year’s Eve mother would light the kerosene lamp and it must not be extinguished for at least the first three days! The lamp must be kept burning throughout the New Year Period. We had no electricity then!

We made sure our round table in the sitting room would have a nice table cloth used only once a year. We decorated the house, had nice curtains on the windows.

On the first day of Chinese New Year, my two brothers and I put on ties the whole day! We all wore new clothes and new shoes.

What I like most were the ‘ang pows’ (red packets) We collected lots of red packets and when the visitors were gone we had to hand them to mother. For she had to give out red packets too! When the celebrations were over, she would then decide how much she would give each one of us.

We were not allowed to sweep the floor during the New Year period for fear of sweeping the good luck away. The broom was kept out of sight.

Thank God when we came to know the Lord, we received the light of Christ and did away with all the superstitions. We keep the traditions that do not conflict with Scripture. In some ways we are quite westernised, but deep down we are still very Chinese.

Today Sunday, we had only one meeting. All other activities were cancelled. And our Major kept the meeting short - one hour five minutes!

So we had a great day - time for worship and fellowship with God and our fellowmen. We prayed with every visitor who came to see us today.