Musings on Chinese New Year -- the Run-up

   Well, CNY is just around the corner and there's a weird combination of total frenzied activity and near shut-down of normal life as we know it.  They've decorated anything that doesn't move and tangerines and other gold-or-red-colored things are moving around the city in 
masses.  So as to allow for this, the usual double-parking has now expanded to include triple-parking and the traffic, even on a motorbike, is truly daunting.  But it's nothing compared to the 800,000 overloaded passenger buses plying the highways and byways of China itself right now.

CNY Lobby decs at G Hotel 

   I missed the run-up of CNY last year because I was "off-station," as they still quaintly call it when you're away from Penang.  For the actual big night (out of the 15 days total), we'd hied ourselves off to Langkawi for some much-needed R & R.  So I don't know exactly how things go here at CNY, but I'm 

Red money gift envelopes (but no money in 'em)

preparing much like those poor folks on the East Coast of the US who are bracing for a looming super snowstorm.  Mr. Motorbike is gassed, oiled, aired and ready to go -- if I just had anyplace to go on it!  I've stocked up on the necessities of life -- Diet Coke, Cup-a-Soup and toilet paper.

     The latter is needed because I have house guests coming back here after a brief sojourn down in KL.   What with the stomach bug they picked up in Myanmar and the one I got in squeaky-clean Singapore, it seemed advisable to stock up on toilet cleaner and paper.   They decided to hunker down here to pass the holidays when they finally realized that the roads will be so congested you can't go anywhere and prices have been jacked up such that you can't afford to eat out or sightsee, much less stay in a decent hotel.  Never mind the crowds as everybody struggles to get home to their family manse and then have fun once they're there.

One of dozens of shops selling CNY decorations

   With those house guests in mind, I went to the nearby Coffee Bean and Tea Leaf outlet (like Starbucks) and asked if they'd be closing for any of the coming three days of CNY holidays.  They about fell down laughing and one said, " Coffee Bean is close when the world is end!"  Now, if they could just manage to keep their to-die-for Cheesy Spinach Muffins in stock, I could survive these holidays happily. 

   

Hopefully a pig for roasting, not a corpse!

    




   
 Uh-oh!  What's this mundane photo doing in a post about Chinese New Year?  It isn't red, pink or gold, glittering or over-the-top, so you might think it has nothing to do with CNY. (Red evidently represents life and gold, prosperity.)  But noooo  -- this is (I think) a pig for roasting for the holidays.   I tried to find out how much it costs, but I couldn't even turn it over in the freezer.  Dead weight!  

    Considering how long it takes to thaw a turkey in America, I have to wonder about how long it would take to thaw this sucker.  And how about the logistics of getting it into a shopping cart and then into your car?  And where would you thaw it in this climate where milk spoils in your fridge about two days after you've bought it?  If it really is a pig, you could easily get a stomach bug and really need the aforementioned toilet paper and cleaner in abundance.  

    This should be an interesting time, culturally speaking, to be in Penang.   

                     Gong Xi Fa Cai !