of "one lup" and cows in a deck

Xin nian kuai le!

It's the Chinese New Year season again and it's also the season for ang pows, CNY cookies, over-eating, more ang pows, gambling, noisy relatives, and even more ang pows! ;) Well, it turns out that I had a pretty decent red packet haul this year, therefore proving my initial estimations wrong. Aside from that however, CNY seems to have lost its shine on me.

I remember the times we would take the 4-hour drive back to Kuala Lipis, through the winding trunk roads, puke maybe twice along the way, past the "King-Kong" bridge, dodge steaming cow pies, to finally arrive at the half-wooden shophouse by the river.

There we (i.e. the kids) would eat Mamee and Twisties and suck on ice lollies to our hearts content.

There we would walk down to the bamboo raft by the river with our fishing nets, trying to bring in the day's catch.

There we would rather suffer from constipation than use the bathrooms which were in a creepy, dark corner of the house.

There we would raid the drawers of the cupboard in front of the medicine shelf in search of Moon Travellers to assault the village kids across the river.

There we would be constantly amused by the family magpie that could say "Apa mau tauke?" and "Miaow miaow MIAOWMIAOW!"

There I would stare at the sagging ceilings at night before going to bed, always thinking in my mind that they reminded me of pregnant women.

CNY today is just a mad frenzy of activities with so much of that old excitement abated. I wish I could bring back the old times.