Chinese New Year Malaysia
February 16, 2008 – 4:13 pmI’m not sure if what I observe here is applicable to West Malaysia, but at least it’s in Borneo. The original CNY is generally a festival surrounding relatives and those with blood connections, but here it has morphed into a friends-CNY.
What do I mean by that? Well, the custom here is laid out well for the first day of CNY. Everyone visits relatives - especially the older ones. The rest of the days, ranging well into the fourth day, belongs to friends, generally. I believe that in other places, the tradition is that generally only relatives visit. Here, students especially gather in large groups and go from house to house, usually for an entire day.
Why is it so? There’s this concept of ‘open house’, which is actually more a tradition of the Malays. Therefore, with the Malaysian Chinese incorporating it into their CNY festival, CNY in Malaysia has become, in a way, truly Malaysian. Wikipedia even says, ‘An open house (or “rumah terbuka”) is a Malaysian concept whereby people celebrating various holidays will invite friends to drop by for festive snacks and fellowship.’
But this CNY Malaysia doesn’t end there. When you enter a house during CNY, you don’t often see oranges and the likes. Instead, there are boxes and boxes of cakes and cookies, courtesy of the Malay ‘Hari Raya’ traditions.
When you take different traditions of different races, and mix them in one festival, you may get a much more festive and wonderful time. And the Malaysian CNY is one of those times.
2 Responses to “Chinese New Year Malaysia”
hey…i like your analysis
By wintie on Feb 20, 2008
I second that, oh how I miss CNY in Msia…even the Malaysians themselves I miss…D: and I take back what I said in FB, you did update..haha..
By GL on Feb 28, 2008