“Okay, Mak,” we said placidly, though we were ready to burst out in whoops.
My family and I performed the ritual of the final rites by going to my father’s grave at the Christian section of the Bidadari Cemetery. This was mostly where the British had buried their dead. As a child, we had watched many a British funeral procession, as well as some military ones. There was a Muslim section across Mount Vernon Road. Bidadari is a Malay word which was supposed to refer to a fairy. Ah Tetia was buried in a plot on the crest of the hill, not far from where his mother was buried. We went through the imposing Victorian wrought-iron gates, then trod up the narrow, paved path, keeping to the shadows of the rain trees’ canopies to protect ourselves from the blazing sun. There in front of the photo on his tombstone, we said our prayers, then symbolically asked his permission to end the mourning period. Following this, we took off the square patch of fabric that we had pinned to our sleeve since his death, which signified our mourning status. We ceremoniously discarded these in his so-called presence. Now we could resume wearing red and all the colours of the rainbow again! Yippee! As soon as we had spring-cleaned the house, we would be able to put up the chai kee, the red fabric above our doorway to attract good fortune. Mak was very deft with her fingers and she had the art of twisting the ends of the red fabric into peony flowers.
The Chinese love for the colour red meant that even the firecrackers were packaged in red. To welcome the New Year, firecrackers and fireworks would be let off. At nights children would play with bunga meriam, an innocuous firework stick which sparkled with light. Upon lighting it, the child would weave it round and round in the air in the night’s darkness, to trace patterns of light. Sometimes their afterlight seemed to linger in the air as if it had a life of its own, before eventually vanishing. The children loved it, especially the very young children who could not play with the more dangerous firecrackers and fireworks.
Firecrackers could be let off individually or strung in a series and hung from the roof or rafters to cascade downward. Sometimes people planted one in the ground, lit it, and then ran for dear life. The richer the household or business, the longer the trail of firecrackers would be. I had seen a rope of large tubular firecrackers descending from buildings several storeys high! It was believed that the loud bangs would frighten away any loitering evil spirits, clearing bad chi energy and bringing in good chi for the household and business to prosper. When the firecrackers were lit from the bottom of a long strand, there would be an explosion of sound and fury which would snake up rapidly in flying sparks, all the way up to the top firecracker. It was an amazing sight to behold. The red paper splintered along its fiery journey, showering bystanders with red confetti and brightening the thresholds with good luck. These would not be swept away. Often, the sound was so thunderous that we had to cup our ears. Dogs and cats outdoors would dash for shelter under vehicles and furniture. The firing of firecrackers was repeated all along the rows of houses, businesses and streets in Singapore, the sounds erupting in different sequences and echoing across the island. It was a distinctive, cheerful sound. For some inexplicable reason, I thought they sounded like the hooves of wild horses galloping and stomping the ground. Not that I had heard or seen any wild horses before! But it was the unique sound that would wake me up on the First Day of every Chinese New Year
But all this was about to change.
Besides the firecrackers, lion dances were invented to create more sound and jollity. Able-bodied young men would prance under a Chinese lion’s head with its fabric scaled body, their hands working the lion’s lower lip and exposing its teeth and tongue. Meanwhile, their colleagues, dressed in the colourful costumes determined by their dialect clans, would make as much noise as they could, with their drums and cymbals. We referred to this as tong tong chir, an onomatopoeic name for the three main notes sounded by the cymbals. Kids would shout, “Tong tong chir is here!” when the Lion dance troupe appeared. This had developed into a Feng Shui practice where every Chinese business or rich household would engage a lion dance troupe on their premises during Chinese New Year, to clear the chi for prosperity and good health. So the firing of firecrackers went hand-in-hand with the boisterous lion dancing.
In our part of the kampong, despite our poverty, it was customary for a neighbour who was celebrating his New Year to send out festive goodies to fellow villagers. I absolutely loved the custom. Ever since I was a little girl, I looked forward to other races’ celebration of
