Tag: chinese new year

The joy of a big family and old-world charm

Happy together:  Lam Foong with her Lai family in their Tronoh hometown in Perak for reunion on Chinese New Year.
Photos by Lai Jen Weng
By Foong Pek Yee
Jan 29, 2023.
At 89, Lam Foong is a picture of  joy and hope.
She keeps herself healthy and happy  by being active and productive daily.
A typical day for her is tending to her garden where she grows a variety of vegetables like potato leaves, long beans, egg plant, spring onion and hairy gourd.
Labour of love:  Lam Foong in her vegetable garden.
And what makes her most happy is she will have  home grow vegetables for her  children and grandchildren when they visit her.
A mother of seven , Lam who is a good cook,  has  plans all year round to cook for her family during festive or holiday season – Chinese New Year, Ching Ming, Mid Autumn Festival , school holidays and public holidays – when her children and grandchildren from Kuala Lumpur and Ipoh will go to their Tronoh hometown to spend time together.
During this Chinese New Year (CNY) their ancestral home saw more than  40 family members of three generations gathered over three days, from new year eve, for the celebration.
Auspicious: Lam Foong’s Chinese New Year specialties for reunion dinner.
The Cantonese pronunciation for  prawns ( ha ) and fish (Yu)  which rhymes with laughter and abundance respectively  are must -have for  festive celebration.
While Lam is a good cook, her children help her in the kitchen and run errands  – a family still steeped in the fine Chinese tradition.
For Lam, preparations for the celebration starts months ahead, from planning the menu, booking the ingredients and planting vegetables.
She also makes sure her children have her home cooked specialties like pork belly and yam and home grow vegetables to bring along when they return to their respective home after the celebration.

Green and fresh : Potato leaves is among Lam Foong’s favourite vegetables.

Beautiful day:  A bird perched on a branch of a rambutan tree in Lam Foong’s garden.

Lam Foong loves to stay in Tronoh while enjoying occasional visits to her children in Kuala Lumpur.

And equally important is she continues to lead and enjoy a healthy and happy lifestyle and the old-world charm.

Staying competitive and popular at all times

Value for money :  Makes Chinese New Year celebrations more joyous.
Jan 19, 2023
By Foong Pek Yee
One big bottle of nga ku chips is priced at RM35, and a small bottle at RM15.
The big bottle has at least three times the amount of that of the  small bottle.
Roadside stall trader Loh See Hoi’s  sales pitch certainly resonates with discerning shoppers these days.
Festive snacks:  Varieties and  value for money.
At 75, Loh is brimming with enthusiasm as he goes about serving customers at his roadside stall in Tanjung Tualang New Village, Perak recently.
Hardworking :  Loh showing a laminated photo of him cooking  his famous sambal sauce at home in Gopeng Perak.
His core  business is homemade sauce and he has been in this business for over three decades.
He sells some snacks during festive seasons.
Loh says his  stall opens  on Saturday and Sunday – almost a 12 hour stretch starting about 9 am.
He says he  chose to set up stall in Tanjung Tualang New Village some 30 years ago as  the village -a haven for seafood dishes-  draws many tourists over weekends and public holidays.
 Tanjung Tualang is also known as Tiger Prawn Town.
On weekdays, Loh and his wife, in her 60s, are at home  in Gopeng, Perak preparing  their sauces.
“I have recipes for over 20 types of sauce,” he says, adding that he likes to experiment and come up with his own recipes.
A bottle of his popular sambal sauce is priced at RM10 .
While cost of doing business keeps going up, Loh says  quality goods and competitive pricing  help  keep business afloat .

A beautiful Spring on the way

Hope: Forward-looking is a strong characteristic of the Chinese.

Dec 22, 2022
By Foong Pek Yee
A person is a year older after eating the first bowl of “tang yuan”  (glutinous rice ball in sweet syrup in Chinese ) on Winter Solstice Festival (Dongzhi).
“Tang Yuan” which rhymes with reunion also makes the delicacy a must have for the festival.
Most of all, the delicacy is  affordable and palatable to the young and old alike as family members gather to celebrate.
Today (December 22, 2022) is the Winter Solstice Festival.
Auspicious:  CNY deco that focus on all things good.
With Chinese New Year  (CNY), also known as Spring Festival,  exactly a month away (on Jan 22, 2023), many traders are hopeful that Dongzhi shoppers are also in the mood for CNY shopping.
My turn: It is Year of the Rabbit starting Jan 22, 2023
Vibrant : Red for good luck and traders are hoping business will pick up as CNY draws near.
Upbeat: A trader livens up the festive mood with CNY songs.
At a wet market in Ipoh, traders are selling CNY deco and delicacies side by side with ready -to-eat  colourful “tang yuan”
One  CNY deco trader says business has yet to pick up, and that she has started selling the items two weeks ago.
She says people may be more cautious with their spending nowadays.
Nevertheless, she is upbeat that business will pick up as the celebration draws near.
Hope: Never too old to persevere.
She says many young people returning to their hometown to celebrate will do last minute shopping for their  family  elderly.
This coming year is Year of the Rabbit – a symbol of peace, energy and joy.
With the lovely  bunny hopping happily, the people are hoping for a good year for all.
Lively:  Plants and flowers are evergreen deco especially during CNY.

Say it with flowers

 

Spring is here: Wan Zi Qian Hong conveys good health, happiness and longevity

By Foong Pek Yee

30 Jan, 2022

SHENTI JIAN KANG, WAN SHI RU YI (good health, all the best in Chinese),  a trader greets customers doing their last minute Chinese New Year (CNY)  shopping.

His sales pitch – good tidings  with flowers – draws customers to his flower stall in the SPPK market in Ipoh on Sunday morning (30 Jan).
The flower –  Wan Zi Qian Hong (tens of thousands of purple and thousands of red ) – an idiom on a garden in full bloom is among his most saleable items.
He says the flower conveys  good health,  happiness and longevity.
A pot of Wan Zi Qian Hong is priced at RM12 and RM35 for a pot of lime tree or  Kum Kut.  
Add value:  Good service brings business
According to him,  it takes six months to grow the Wan Zi  Qian Hong.
The timing is such that they will bloom during  CNY.
I bought his last three pots of Wan Zi  Qian Hong while another shopper snapped up the last two pots of Kum Kut   ( a symbol of prosperity
On a more serious note,  he says farmers and traders are treading cautiously this round.
Besides the pandemic, he says the increase in the price of  fertilisers and  pesticides and labour shortage have also  dampen the market.
A trader who sells cut flowers says there are not many varieties this round.
According to her, economic uncertainty,  financial constraints and  labour shortage saw many farmers cutting down on their production.
Her advice is to buy flowers early as stock is limited.
Among her saleable items is the yellow hulu (gourd) fruit – a symbol of good health, productivity and wealth.
Striking colour: The Hu Lu  fruits of different size  represent several generations together.

Chinese New Year mood in the air

Red lanterns:  A symbol of everything good.
By Foong Pek Yee
23 Jan, 2022
THERE is an air of festivity in Ipoh over the weekend.
With Chinese New Year (CNY) on Feb 1,  the Ipoh old town is a hive of activity.
CNY or  Lunar New Year or Spring Festival is celebrated worldwide.
The  Koreans  celebrate Lunar New Year  or ” Seollal”
The boss of a shop in Ipoh old town which is famous for dried seafood appears  in good mood.
On his most saleable items, he reels out a list – from abalone, mushrooms, scallops, oysters, sea cucumber to pistachio (hoi sum guo  or  happy fruit in Cantonese).
With his eyes glued to the workers unloading goods from a lorry, he went on to elaborate  why business is good in the year of the Tiger.
Upbeat: A shop in Ipoh old town that specialises in dried foodstuff especially seafood, is all set for brisk business.
“People will spend their CNY holidays enjoying good food at home or in restaurants.
“Unlike previous years when there were  people who went for overseas holidays, they cannot do so this round even if  they have the money .”
Along the five-foot way, a man was engrossed writing Chinese characters with good tidings with a Chinese brush on pieces of red paper.
Best wishes: Chinese saying on anything good and written on red papers is an evergreen deco.
Steep in tradition: A bookshop in Kampar old town selling CNY greeting cards  – a rare commodity in this digital era.
Good tidings: A shop in Tambun with its first batch of pomeloes.
But there may be a shortage of pomeloes this CNY – a much sought after fruit because its Cantonese name “look yau” rhymes with abundance rolling in.
According to a fruit shop owner in Tambun,  Ipoh,  the recent raining season which coincided with the trees flowering stage had affected the yields.
Tambun, about 7 km from Ipoh city centre, is famous for producing good pomeloes.
In Kampar wet market, a flower stall owner expects a shortage of flowers from Cameron Highlands as farmers are not producing at full capacity.
“Farmers are treading carefully after losing so much last CNY due to the movement control order,”  says the stall owner who has been in the business for almost four decades.
On consumer spending, he says people are extra prudent nowadays because of the high cost of living and economic uncertainties.
Perseverance:  This man who runs a flower stall for almost four decades tending to his CNY plants.
He says he will soldier on, and last weekend saw him busy meeting orders for bouquets from graduates at the convocation ceremony in Universiti Tunku Abdul Rahman (UTAR) nearby.