A Chinese Wedding in Singapore

Some months ago, David bought home an envelope addressed to the family. I opened it and found a card that seemed to say HoHo HoHo on it. I asked what that was and he told me to turn it round. Ah, of course, now all was clear. It was something in Chinese writing. But what? It turned out to be an invitation to us all to the wedding of one of David's staff, Wyne, and his girlfriend Jan.


We'd known they were planning a wedding as they'd recently bought an apartment together. Here, if a couple get a place together, they can't live there out of wedlock indefinitely, but have to marry within 3 months. They had moved in and gone through an interesting set of rituals as Jan's mother is very traditional. No sooner had they cleaned the place from top to bottom that the mid autumn festival started and Jan's mother insisted they thrown rice all over the place amongst other rituals.

Finally the day of the wedding arrived. We had been invited to an evening event, a formal (and legal) ceremony with a dinner for about 200 guests. The children had been invited too, but after much deliberation, we decided not to take them as it was a Sunday night and wouldn't finish until after 10pm.

Wyne then invited us to the daytime events which he hoped the children would find fun and interesting, as they were missing out later.

This involved us arriving at Jan's parents house at 9am in the morning, when Wyne arrived with a group of close friends known as "the brothers". He arrived at the bride's parent's house to collect the bride but, as is the custom here, he has to prove himself to get in through the door. This involved performing a number of tasks set by Jan's close friends "the sisters".

On arrival, he offered a large and decorated red envelope (ang pow) of money to the bride's mother. This was taken in, then returned "not enough". Oranges were offered and then the sisters set various tasks that included drinking a cup of vinegar. This was all conducted with much hilarity and increased Ang Pow offerings and finally, after about 20 or 30 minutes he got into the house.


However, this was not the end as further tasks awaited him inside. These included eating a chili sandwich and some other offerings that didn't look too tasty, then he was given a test on Jan. Questions included asking her home phone number (which he failed miserably as he always calls her mobile) and then he was asked her favourite bra colour. He innocently claimed he wouldn't yet know that but one of the brothers said "bra colour? I think we need to discuss" and they went into a giggling huddle. Finally, he had to make a 15 word sentence that told Jan why he wanted to marry her. However, he then had to find the first letter of each word and place them in order - the letters were tiny macaroni letters and I think a number had been removed to make the task harder still! With "assistance" and ideas from the brothers, they finally put something together and after ascertaining which closed door Jan was behind, he said his sentence and the door was eventually opened.

Once they were united, everyone got in their cars and drove off to Wyne's place (30 minutes away) for a tea ceremony there, hosted by his parents. There were photos taken and as we had the only children there (this was a smaller event with about 30 people rather than 200), they were asked to sit on the bed. Apparently this helps with fertility. Adam was then asked to jump up and down and roll about on the bed which he duly did and was photographed - this is to assist the production of a son for them. Unfortunately, Hannah refused to do this solo for the photographer, so having a girl may now be harder for them!



Next was a traditional tea ceremony where the younger generation show respect to various members of the older generation and kneel down and pass them tea to drink. After this Jan changed out of her white dress and into a traditional red and gold chinese style dress. There was a small buffet and then it was all back in the cars and back to Jan's parents place for her family's tea ceremony and another buffet. The whole thing was over by about 2pm and various friends and family had kindly explained the proceedings to us, and expressed surprise that our traditions were so different. At this point, with the traditions done, Wyne and Jan were considered married, however they still needed to do the legal ceremony later.

That evening, we headed back to a far flung country club which turned out to be the wedding capital of Singapore. Numerous function rooms were hosting weddings and we finally found the right function room. We were checked off on the list and we put our wedding gift (an ang pow) into the box and were then let in and given a drink. David found the menu and read it out to me. I thought he was winding me up with some of it, except that I didn't think he would come up with "Braised Sea Cucumber with Fish Maw" or "Marinated Jelly Fish" etc.

We went to admire a spectacular wedding cake only to find it was cardboard. The tradition has come here and they even posed as if cutting it, but they are not big cake eaters, so they don't go to the trouble of a real one!


With everybody sitting down, the bride and groom finally came in and the legal ceremony was conducted, not dissimilar to a short registry office do (although instead of "I do" they both said "yes" which somehow sounded rather odd!).


After, the room was plunged into darkness and then loud, dramatic music began. The waiting staff came in with platters and as they walked to each table, lights lit up the way ahead. Finally all the staff and starters had arrived and the lights were back on. We could see again and the food was placed on a lazy susan on the table. It was, certainly beautifully presented, but below I've put in a photo of the menu. Just double click to enlarge it.



All I can say is that whilst some dishes were very nice, like the chicken. Jelly fish is akin to rubber bands and in an attempt to show willing, we both tried things that wouldn't normally be our first choice, and will probably never eat again! I'm so glad the pudding had ice-cream with it though, as I'm not sure I'd have managed much of that without.

Once the meal was finished, Wyne and Jan visited every table for photos and, in Wyne's case, some dubious offerings of drinks, and there were some toasts. The toast is "Yam Sing". Everyone starts a long, drawn out Yam then, suddenly, after 2 or 3 minutes, as if by some magic timing, there is a short Sing and glasses are drained. It went something like "Yaaaaaaaaaaaaaaa....Yaaaaaaaaaaaaaa....Yaaaaaaaaaaaaaam Sing" and it sort of translates to bottoms up and after a few of these and yet another outfit for Jan, the wedding was over. The bride, groom and parents all made a reception line and greeted everyone on the way out and we filed out with the other guests.


We'd been at a table with the other office staff who had explained various points and been astonished at the differences we found to British weddings. These became apparent when we had no idea was to expect or what was going on at times. However, as the venue was so large, one guest at our table had gone to the wrong function room. She'd been photographed arriving and only when her name wasn't on the guest list as she waited to put her ang pow in the box, did it become apparent that she was at the wrong wedding! At least we didn't make that mistake!



It's certainly an event we won't forget in a hurry and it's always interesting, if slightly daunting at times, to get the opportunity to attend a local traditional event, so we are grateful to Wyne and Jan for inviting us and including us in their day.


This is a photo of the first of the Tea Ceremonies with Wyne, Jan and Wyne's parents.

Made in Taiwan

I think the title of of this entry is how most of us think about Taiwan. However, when I asked David if he had any overdue business trips that we could do in the October half term, he said Taiwan was top of his list.

Like Phuket, it had never been on my original list of must see destinations, but whilst in Borders, I browsed through a couple of travel books and was very surprised to see that it clearly had fabulous scenery and a good few places worth visiting. The more I read, the more interesting it became, so we booked our flights. A Taiwanese friend of Adam's at school was dispatched by his mother with a bunch of tourist brochures and information, so after lots of reading, we planned to spend our week there dividing our time between Taipei and an area of outstanding natural beauty on the east coast, The Taroko Gorge, where we planned to do some walking.

It was hard to know how to pack. David always remembered being hot there and the BBC weather forcast was showing temperatures much hotter than here. But shortly before we were due to go, a Super Typhoon that wreaked havoc in the Philippines parked itself in the sea between the two countries. We waited - should we go, or was it going to arrive in Taiwan when we did? It slowly downgraded itself to a tropical deperssion but didn't move much, so off we went.

The night before we left, David lost his mobile phone, so the first morning was spent trying to buy a local SIM card, so he could contact the office and clients. As the children hadn't learnt useful Mandarin sentences about mobile phones at school, this proved quite challenging - especially as we're not residents. We also found, on arrival, that I'd managed to forget to pack any pants or socks for Hannah. We did manage to do some sight seeing the first day, but spent much of it shopping. There's nothing like trying to find stuff in a city you don't know, when you don't speak the language. Hannah ended up with a couple of pairs of very expensive, designer pants and socks as, on day one, that was all we could find for kids.

We then headed off to the tourist information office at the main station to get train times and book our tickets to the Gorge. On arrival, the staff told us that the typhoon was causing torrential rain on that coast and that many trails in the gorge were closed to due land or mud slides or the risk of them. This didn't sound ideal hiking conditions, after some thought, we abandoned that plan. The TI staff kindly offer to call the hotel I'd already booked and cancel on our behalf. They even negotiated a discount on the cancellation fee for us!

Armed with yet more leaflets and our guide book, we then spent time trying to sort out an alternative destination for those 2 to 3 days. It felt like a return to our back-packing days, but we soon concluded that most places of interest that weren't in the east, would take several hours to get to and from and that there was more than enough in and around Taipei to keep us busy and give us a good variety. Adam was devastated as it meant we didn't go on the train, but when we saw reports of landslides in the local (English language) paper the following morning we felt we'd made the right decision.

The next day, the weather was still cool and mostly wet so we spent another morning shopping for warmer clothes for all of us. Sometimes nice items were made less appealing by oddly translated phrases on them, such as "Pink Poke" or, on a children's top "JUNIOR COWer"??? We also found, at a night market, a selection of cheaper pants and socks to add to Hannah's collection, although she hated the style of the pants has stated quite categorically that she will never, ever wear them again, because they look like boxer shorts!

We visited temples, night markets, museums, a former gold mining and now scenic tourist area, an area of hot springs and paddled in a river that was like a hot bath. The kids enjoyed several visits to a restaurant near the hotel where you choose your food and cook it in a pot of soup on your table. We caught an old, local branch line train (the Pingxi line) along a lovely wooded gorge and visited some waterfalls. As is a tradition in these particular villages, we set off a lantern after first writing our wishes on it. See the video clip of this event.

Sometimes, the highlights weren't what we expected - in a Ceramics museum in a town outside Taipei, the children joined in a children's ceramics workshop and made bowls - the whole thing was conducted in Mandarin and although they didn't understand anything much, it didn't stop them having fun! We went to the Science Centre, a great place for children, but arrived after the ticket desk closed due to a mistake in our guide book. A member of staff kindly let us in for free and took us to some of the best bits and we had the exhibitions (all very hands on) to ourselves!

Whilst we tried to negotiate our way to the scenic Pingxi branch line (using 2 trains to get there), a platform attendant, in answer to us asking him if he spoke English, told us "no English, but sing" then, much to our surprise he launched into a loud rendition of a song in English. We (and a few nearby Taiwanese) applauded at the end, as we felt we should, whereupon he then started on Swing Low, Sweet Charriot! Fortunately, at this point, the train arrived and some kindly locals ensured we didn't miss it.

Finally, right at the end of the week, the weather improved and the clouds cleared and we finally made it up Taipei 101. At the time of writing, it is still the tallest building in the world.

Here it is, towering above Taipei at dusk.

Our memories of Taipei will be mixed between the wonderful people - surely some of the most friendly and delightful anywhere - and the impressive temples and stunning scenery. While other memories will be of the everyday architecture - the buildings that the vast majority of people live in. Here the architecture goes seriously downhill in design, if not, apparently, in price! Grey, functional and unloved, rather like many of China's less appealing buldings put up in the communist era.

And the food - not all of it was to our taste, but we had many good meals there, but so often whilst walking around, there would be an overwhelming stench of something from the street stalls that smelt very seriously off. We discovered this was known as "stinky tofu". I have no idea what is done to it, but it could be seen boiling in some noxious, dark liquid - the idea that anybody could bring themselves to eat it defies belief, but presumably people do. To anyone who has smelt the durian fruit in Asia and likened it to bad drains etc, stinky tofu makes durian smell positively delicious!

A feeling of de-ja vu....

Just how fast can a year go by?


In September, as I walked to our local "wet market" through the local housing estate, the offerings of food were out again to appease the hungry ghosts, along with the incense sticks. Along with the offerings were old oil drums placed where people could use them to burn the special "paper money" for their ancestors in Heaven and Hell. This is so they can pay their fines in Hell for their wrong doings in life and get to Heaven, or simply to have funds in Heaven. It seems that even in Heaven, there is no such things as a free lunch.




I can't believe it was a year ago that we witnessed this all for the first time and went to the annual lantern display at the Chinese Gardens. For the lantern festival, our condo again had a party. As last year, they held, amongst other things, a national costume competition for the children.



Hannah had wanted to join in last year but, being British, we don't really have a national costume (and we don't even have a kilt here to pretend to be Scottish). But then we had a brainwave - there was nothing in the rules that stated you had to wear your own national costume and Hannah has a lovely flamenco dress we bought on our last visit to Spain.




So that was it - we changed nationality for the night and Hannah put on her dress and we pinned her hair into a bun and put a flower in it too. She looked very pretty, but did have some tough competition from lovely kimonos, chinese dresses and a couple of very pretty Indian costumes. Each child paraded one by one down a ramp by the pool (a sort of catwalk). She didn't win but many people complimented her outfit. Here she is by the pool with her lantern.




All the children were given prizes though - and those (mostly under 10) who were in the national costume got a soft toy desktop mobile phone holder. Just what ever 7 year old needs! However, we found a use for it and it now holds her aircon remote control for her bedroom.



Another year and another UN Day at school too. The lack of an English national costume reared its head again, so it was necessary to find a theme. This year, the parents who kindly organised the England kids came up with the theme of the British seaside. The children were asked to dress in shorts and T-shirts or swim stuff with a as much red and white as possible, to go with the St Georges flags they would all be carrying.



At our condo, waiting for the school bus, our two looked very undressed as the two Japanese girls were in gorgeous kimonos and the young Indian twins were in very colourful punjabi suits. The other family who are British Indian had decided to be Indian as well this year rather than English, so again, they looked much more dressed up. But when the parade started, the English group looked very colourful and, fortunately, far better than we'd anticipated.




Then it was the whirl around the classrooms visiting as many "countries" as possible and tasting lots of traditional foods followed by the concert. This year, there were some chairs for adults and I was pretty pleased to have gone into the hall early enough to ensure I had one. This was a huge improvement on last year during which the concert was lovely but we all had very numb bums from sitting on the floor for so long by the end of it.



I can't believe that our original plan had us returning to the UK around now. It's gone by in a flash and we're far from ready to leave. Somehow, I have a feeling that before we know it, we'll be doing all this again and that feeling of de-ja vu will return in no time.