Twenty feet up in the air the lion dancers do their amazing acrobatics. Each Lion is made of two people hopping around on steel poles like they are playing children's hopscotch, often one on top of the other's shoulder in a frenzy to the drums beating and cymbols clanging - fantastic.
Langkawi Island in Malaysia is truly a picturesque place.
Everywhere we fly Mya wears her Singapore airline outfit. Here we are being greeted at our hotel.
Mya enjoys herself in her new chinese outfit. All children are given new clothes to bring in the New Year.
One of my Singapore families - the Chays. My two sisters Cecilia and Omoh and of course my Mama.
Lo Hei is the tradtitional dish served at family reunion dinners during Lunar New Year. Here we are mixing our good fortune to celebrated the coming of the New Year. It is such an honour to be considered part of the family and to be invited to such memorable cultural gatherings.
Mya dressed as "Nien" the lion dragon, respectfully gives the traditional two oranges to my SINGAPORE MUM.
You know George loves to call me "Panda". Well, he got to hug another Panda- a real one in Chendu China.
We loved Chinese New Year. It’s always a time of year as special as Christmas to us. We had friends come for a sleepover - 2 kids and mum - it was great fun for them to experience living in the suburbs. Embarrassingly, our house was the best decorated in the street – even though we are not Chinese. Mya dressed several times in her lion dance costume and brought lots of happiness and laughter to people. We had a reunion dinner with our Singapore family- it's so nice to be considered part of their family. We visited all the neighbours and gave the children Ang Paos (red envelopes) with money in them and did the very important visits to my two Singapore mums and gave them the traditional 2 oranges. What was lovely was Mya got a really good education on the "behind the tradition" stories. She was also the only girl to be chosen for the lion dance at school. They also had a steam boat lunch at school to celebrate Chinese New Year. She's so unafraid of trying Chinese food like fish ball soup and hard boiled eggs in soy sauce. It’s a delight to watch her eat so “globally”. As I write this our neighbourhood is abuzz with a lion dance being performed in our street as one of the nighbours celebrates Chinese New Year with their family in their new home. Mya and Ferilita have gone down to watch the performance. We woud have seen 1/2 dozen different performances this year and they never cease to delight. The acrobatic one on poles was the best. The celebrations go on for 15 days. We had a night on the Singapore River watching the fireworks. I just love Chinese New Year.
Then we received all the boxes that I'd sent from Australia – so it was finding them a place too (almost like another house move) but I’m happy to have everything I own in the one house for a change. Lots of mum's things came, and also all my quilting bits and pieces and materials. The best thing was "MY BABY" arrived. Yes after almost 10 years of wanting a Horn sewing cabinet I bought one before I left Aus and got it in my shipment and miraculously it arrived all in one piece. How lovely.... It's a wide and deep as a coffee table, but when you open it, it almost fills the sewing room when fully expanded. It has room for my sewing machine, my over locker, my teaching size cutting board, my iron and ironing board, project and patterns. I've been really enjoying sewing and have finished quite a few UFO's. I even designed a new bag style all by myself recently and I felt really good to design something so different from scratch.
Then we received all the boxes that I'd sent from Australia – so it was finding them a place too (almost like another house move) but I’m happy to have everything I own in the one house for a change. Lots of mum's things came, and also all my quilting bits and pieces and materials. The best thing was "MY BABY" arrived. Yes after almost 10 years of wanting a Horn sewing cabinet I bought one before I left Aus and got it in my shipment and miraculously it arrived all in one piece. How lovely.... It's a wide and deep as a coffee table, but when you open it, it almost fills the sewing room when fully expanded. It has room for my sewing machine, my over locker, my teaching size cutting board, my iron and ironing board, project and patterns. I've been really enjoying sewing and have finished quite a few UFO's. I even designed a new bag style all by myself recently and I felt really good to design something so different from scratch.
George had business trips to China and Vietnam (Ho Ci Minh City). He had a spare few hours in China and had the wonderful experinece of holding the Pandas. He rang me and said "You and Mya have got to do this!" So we are going in June. It's rare that George gets to do anything touristy when working. In 2 years of going to China almost every month - he's only climbed the great wall of China and held the Pandas. It's a shame we are so close and can't go with him. Company policy! It is verbotten to have family fun when husband iz verking 24hours a day for zee company! Das is nicht gut.
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