Chineseness

Soon after our Company Annual Lunch on 12 February, I was driving back to the office with one of my staff and we chatted about Chinese new year. I was surprised to discover that many of the practices that we did before the 1970's are still being followed by the family of this staff of mine.

This staff of mine being a Sino (Chinese father and Kadazan mother) still follows some of the CNY rituals: take bath with water boiled with pomelo leaves at new year eve; no foul language during CNY and no sweeping during the first day of CNY. It still amazes me that there are people still holding on to the idea that bathing in water boiled with pomelo leaves would wash off bad luck and cast away evil spirits and that sweeping on the first day of CNY is taboo because it might accidentally sweep away incoming good fortune and wealth.

This year, we spent our CNY in Batu Pahat. We stayed in a homestay in a housing estate not far from Sri Gading. Lighting of firecrackers started at 12 midnight sharp after the CNY Eve at the house next door and throughout the neighborhood. We were kept awake for the next hour. 

Firecrackers are banned in Malaysia. Still, there was not a single year throughout Malaysian history that lighting of firecrackers has stopped. By hook or by crook, some Chinese families still manage to obtain firecrackers to usher in the new year. For some Chinese, it is unthinkable that CNY could be ushered in without firecrackers.

In the end, I was drawn back to one question. How do you define a Chinese? You are a Chinese as long as you have Chinese gene. Many would disagree to this. A more correct answer would be: A Chinese is someone who continues keeping and maintaining the Chinese culture, practices and tradition though some may seem irrelevant and silly in this ever advancing technological age. Then again, can a non-Chinese be considered a Chinese if he keep all the practices and traditions considered Chinese?

When there is a feeling that you are slowly losing your Chineseness or Chinese identity, the urge to keep maintaining the Chinese values and tradition would be heightened. This is probably why Chinese culture could never be erased or replaced no matter how intense the pressure be there through legislation and authoritarian rule.

But Chineseness and Chinese characteristics of a Chinese is not something that stays unchanged and remains stagnant, it is still evolving and ever changing.

Decorating trees with angpow is a fairly new phenomenon,
probably borrowed from the idea of decorating
a Christmas tree. 

Lunar Eclipse & Blood Moon

Before 31 January, a lot of information was being circulated in the electronic media about this lunar eclipse leading to bloodmoon, a supermoon and bluemoon all three phenomena happening at the same time. This phenomenon was last seen 152 years ago on 31 March 1866.

Supermoon because the moon would be at the nearest position to the earth in its orbit, 360,199 km compared to average of 382,900 km. It would appear 14% larger and 30% brighter. A bluemoon because it's the second full moon of the month. Thirdly, a total lunar eclipse or the bloodmoon. This happens when the earth is aligned in between the sun and the moon in a straight line. Bloodmoon would appear when the blue colour sunlight would be filtered by the earth's atmosphere leaving the red and orange light being projected onto the moon surface.

Not to miss out of this one-in-a-lifetime rare event, we decided to join the crowd at Yayasan Sabah organized by the Sabah Stargazers.

At the sighting, we were fortunate to get to know a stargazer who came with his powerful telescope. He willingly offered his phone contact to many of the bystanders so that all the phases of the moon orbits during the eclipse could be shared with us.

The stargazer who shared all the sightings with the public,

20:10

20:36

20:45 - Beginning of Blood Moon.

20:52

20:57

21:25 - Full Eclipse

21:36

22:14