Talismans? Not Really..
Today is Qin Ming Festival.
It's basically a time in the year where all the traditional Chinese people go and respect their ancestors. They go to their ash tablets, their graves, their tombs, and give it a quick sweep, fussy it up with some flowers, and burn some paper money.. hoping their loved ones who departed to who-knows-where would receive the money.
Okay, that sums up THIS day of oceanic swarms of people flooding the crematoriums around Singapore.
I didn't know it was Qin Ming today actually, until my mum woke me up at 8.30 am with a phone call from my grandma's house.
"John ah, come down to Ah ma's place by 9! We're going to visit your late-grandfather,"
I was still groggy... and I was like... 9? You can't be serious... So I told her I'll come abit later. Actually I was intending to pon the whole thing altogether - save time right? - :X lol. And it's been awhile since I woke up so early... so I wanted to go back to bed and peng. I know all those people in secondary schools and JCs must be going "How Can You Say That!?" But yeah. I wake up 10-ish on a daily-basis. Muahahaha :D
But Mr. Conscious loved my Granddad alot, and he says it's only out of respect and filial piety that I go and honour him. So I eventually got out of the house and walked to granny's. Then uncle drove us to the Mandai Crematorium. It's the massive one that Mr. Wee Kim Wee was cremated in. So we went in and it was just soooo packed man.
I stared at the people - woah - quite stunned so many people came to respect their ancestors. I was surprised so many Singaporean chinese still had the word "Tradition" hard-wired into their brains. *zap zap* So that inspired myself to do this practice even when I grow up... you know, just to keep the hierarchy in place.
Then uncle bought me to go see Great great grandmother's tablet. Who was my mother's father's father's mother. Okay... complicated right? Let's stick with great great grandmother. Lol. Her tablet was all the way on the top. And uncle was explaining to me he heard that she was a very fierce woman when she was alive. So I spend the whole time there trying to imagine how she was like. Chinese those days were fierce, and obedience was expected from every child or else it's a tight slap across your face.
Very much unlike the delinquency we see now. Myself included sometimes.. lol.
So I imagined she drank when she was angry (uncle says she's quite a drinker), and she'd punish my great grandfather when he does wrong. Maybe leave him outside in the night for a day? Or cane him like crazy. Or something like that. The thing about the yesteryears is that you could do all that, and no one would whine about human rights. Haha.
I think my dad should be a great son. He is filial, repectful, quirky sometimes. And he was taught not to smoke, drink, gamble, not even have coffee. So I guess his dad must've been damn strict on him. You know in those days parenting was way easier for chinese ppl - whack the child, teach the child to be independant, give him all the nessacities he needs. Now, it's all about loving your children, be sensitive towards them and all that. See the difference? So much happens in 40 years. Haha... amazing!
40 years down when we become the parents, maybe we have to listen to our children all the time! Ok ok, just kidding..lol