Filed under: Celebrating Ah Por's birthday
Parents and little me with grandma outside no.10. Ah Por seen wearing her festive kwa
The family home was no.10…no not Downing Street but Loh Boon Siew Road. This house is as iconic to the Chew clan as No 10 is to the world. In fact we used to refer to it as No.10.
Every year, we would celebrate Ah Por’s birthday. Fortunately for us, her birthday coincided with the end of year school holidays. Hence everybody who could, would make a pilgrimage back to Penang. It was by far a bigger reunion for us than Chinese New Year.
A few days before her birthday, I would be getting all excited. There were very few cousins in my age group left in Penang. Youngest aunt (ee chye) had moved toIpoh. Sixth aunt (luk ee) lived first in Johore, then in KL. Ah Por’s birthday celebration was the only event that would get everybody to congregate. Hence, on the day of my cousins’ arrival, mum and I would be parked at no 10, and wait for the cars to arrive.
No.10 was not a mansion. It was somewhat an in-between sort of house – between the traditional Chinese homes of old, and the modern terrace house. The ceilings were high, there were two living areas, a central open air courtyard, and a rather large backyard.
There were only 3 bedrooms. Kou foo or 1st uncle had his own room, as befitting his status in the family. The back room was occupied by 3rd aunt (sam yee) who was eccentric and rather aggressively senile even though she was still fairly young. She was like Boo Radley from To Kill a Mockingbird – someone whom we all feared.
The front room was very roomy. The most memorable thing in the front room was the little peephole on the floorboard. The aunts told me that in the old days, young girls were not allowed to socialize if young men came to the home. Some of these young men could be suitors. So the ladies would peep through this hole to see who was coming to the house. How cool!
Anyway the room housed Grandma’s huge four poster bed – the type that you see in peranakan houses, though less elaborate. To us kids, it was cavernous. It was much higher than normal beds, and the bedding was very hard. Hence, it did not require much prompting for us to clamber onto the bed, and made it our playground. The game I remembered the best was one that a much older cousin, Ching jie jie, invented. She would sit on the bed, legs crossed, a stick in her hand, and pretend to be a hermit shifu in her cave. There she would espouse words of wisdom to us juvenile cousins, and send us into the kungfu world to be robin hoods and heroes. We obeyed our kungfu master with respectful subservience.
The cousins I looked forward to seeing the most were luk yee’s children. This was the most happening group as they appeared the most anglicized. They seemed to enjoy the most freedom. I hear them talking and laughing and see them… heaven forbid dancing! Gosh – what decadence – what joy! These cousins, especially Lucia, would forever be joking. Yee Cheong and Luk Ee looked so happy together. Their very presence lifted the lonely atmosphere that pervaded no.10 most of the year.
Besides, Theodore is one year my senior. I had always wanted an older brother to fight my battles, and he was the only one near enough to play that role. (After having my own kids, the oldest being a boy, I realize that the older brother hero concept is a myth that originated from Enid Blyton’s books!)
Weng Foon is 3 years my junior – daughter of my ee chye. Ee chye was the youngest of the family, the 10th daughter, and the 13th child. Grandma had 13 children, but one daughter – the seventh, died as a child. How incredible to have such a huge family.
Weng Foon, in those days, was something of a brat. She was so cute, so fair, that all my aunts doted on her. I on the other hand was dark, gawky and somewhat clumsy. Hence I was the one who would get into trouble, while Weng Foon would escape scott free. Theodore and the rest, were treated as rare guests and never suffered any ire. I and another male cousin my age, Seng Chye, would bear the brunt. Theodore simply could not stand this injustice, and would often fight with Weng Foon in an attempt to right a wrong. Now do you wonder why he is my hero? And why I still remember him so fondly?
Night time was a real party. With so many people in town, I would often refuse to go home. So imagine the no in the front room! Usually it would house my grandma, 6 of my aunts, 5 – 7 female cousins, depending on how many could make it to town. We all slept on the floor, packed tight, giggling through the night at the sound of the night symphony courtesy of the fairly rhythmic snoring – the double base from Kou Foo (maternal uncle), the tenor from the yee cheongs, (yee cheong = husband of maternal aunt) who would be in the next room combined with the alto and soprano ‘breathing’ of aunties. It was louder than any rock concert!
In the day, the younger cousins would have a blast – playing hide and seek, going to the beach or simply just play ‘catching’ along the streets. Once my cousin Theodore was playing slipper football, and kicked his slipper so hard it landed on the roof of no. 2. We had to apologise to the neighbour, and sheepishly confess our misdeeds to the aunts, heaping coals of wrath on our heads.
In the evening we would walk to Gurney Drive. It was wonderful just to talk nonsense with my cousins. I mean as an only child, for me this was like a being let loose in Willie Wonka’s chocolate factory. Gurney Drive had only very few stalls then – a kacang putih stall, maybe a soyabean stall and a rojak stall. There were the usual restaurants of course, but we did not really have that much money to splurge. We were content with the occasional ice cream and just spending time together. Will post about Gurney Drive another day, or else this story will never end.
Anyway, on D-day, we were supposed to be on our best behaviour. In the morning, all of us would be scrubbed clean and queued up to make the birthday greetings. Not just happy birthday! We had to say the auspicious greetings such as:
Nin nin yau kum yat, shui shui yau kum chew (every year there is today, every age have this morning – it’s a longevity greeting duh)
Fook you dong hoi, Sau bei lam shan (your prosperity is like the eastern ocean and your longevity is comparable the southern mountains)
Those were the only two I could manage! Haha. This would be followed by a sweet drink with red dates, longans, gingko nuts, lotus nuts and an egg. We all had to eat the egg which represented life. The afternoon, the aunts would be really busy, leaving us unsupervised. That was when we often got into trouble. One year I remembered falling and scraping my knees really badly. Apart from applying concentrated iodine on my badly scraped knee and causing agony, I knew the worst was still to come. No, not caning – something worse.
When evening swung around, and when every body had gathered, it was time to serve my Ah Por her tea. Grandma would sit on her black wood chair, dressed in her kwa. She looked regal. In front of her was a coconut husk mat – donno why they did not use softer mats. Starting from the oldest, ie my kou foo, we would have to kneel and serve tea. Then she would give each a hong bao. When it came to my turn, I winced, and gingerly let myself down. It was an auspicious occasion, and I was not allowed to cry, or show any form of negativism. So I had to grit my teeth and offered more greetings to Ah Por as the very scratchy coconut husk fibre cut into my wounds.
With that over, dinner was served. What a meal. What a ruckus. The elders had their own table, and we inferior beings had to troop over to their table and speed greet all of them. The faster that was done, the sooner we get to eat. Greetings should be done according to rank – ie the highest ranking greeted first. So we had to begin with our uncles and aunts and their respective spouses. Then we still had to greet cousins older than us, and be greeted by those younger. So much fun. The greetings went like this
Kou foo sek fun (maternal uncle eat rice – the traditional greeting)
Ee kou sek fun (2nd maternal uncle eat rice)
Ee kam sek fun (2nd maternal uncle’s wife eat rice)…on and on
.For me it would end with Theodore kor kor sek fun!
Now we did not wait our turn to speak – or else with so many of us, it would take forever. So we tried to out do each other in terms of volume and speed. Somehow, the adults were not annoyed, but seemed rather please with buzz.
Then we hurried back to our table. The food was delicious. Better yet, there was free flow of soft drinks – what a treat! What fun!
I really miss family gatherings like these. My children still experience a watered down version during Chinese New Year at my husband’s uncle’s place. But it was no where as cosy or as noisy as my days in no. 10.
