It’s such an interesting time to come Chinese New Year every year. I think everyone knows what to expect, but at the same time, we’re all trying to find ways to survive the arduous journey of it.
There’s a mix of feelings. You haven’t seen some of your family for the whole year, but it comes with questions that only your family members would ask. Funny enough, this year I didn’t have many questions about if we’re looking to have kids, or anything along those lines. But it was good having conversations about life, and about the values we have in Singapore as a whole.
I don’t think we always come to the same answers of value in Singapore. I think there’s a majority of people who enjoy life in it’s current state, and I can totally understand and relate to that. And yet, I know there’s an undercurrent of culture changing the future, whether we like it or not. Mentally, I’m gearing for a change in life as a whole. I don’t know what it will look like, and I’m just preparing my mind for a lot of change to come. Celebrating things like Chinese New Year, it might change greatly in time to come.
Maybe it’s just the way life is panning out for many of us now. Our growing silver generation has its set of challenges, and the systems we place in this post modern era continue to drive a bigger divide because of technology. It’s funny because of how obvious the tech divide is, and yet, we don’t do anything to change it. It doesn’t help anything, because everyone on the tech side of things will continue to build up their virtual walls. And those who are not tech savvy, will build their physical ones. It’s really just plain in sight, and I find it strange that no one really wants to deal with it.
I just hope to bridge things a lot of the time. I do understand how it works, and the apprehensions to tech and to join two very different groups of people together. It turns out strange really often, but I guess in this Chinese New Year, I really got to see a fun twist.
It was fun to see how we would have physical gatherings, but we would be on our socials to make sure its documented. One of my aunt’s forgot to pack an ang pao, and I suggested an eAng Pao as an option, and it was funny, because it would really work out quite okay in an era like this.
Maybe I should think harder about how I want to approach the bridging better, and how I would want to share better with others.
How I survived most things this year: I was reading in the coolest parts of the houses I got invited to. It was really hot this year, and I had a bunch of books that were going to expire on rental. I was the weird uncle sitting in a corner, reading away. Haha.
What a fun Chinese New Year it has been.