Celebration!

Hola hola! How're you guys? This entry must be incredibly delayed, but I suppose it's still pretty early in the year to wish you guys a Happy New Year :)

What's been going down? Everything's been going down. Literally. I haven't been able to switch my schooling-mode on eversince our christmas holidays, and that's been causing me to arriive late at school everyday. Every morning's been such a repetition, it's such a sick joke having to run through the front office everytime to sign the late form. Well, I guess it's really up to me to fix my organizational skills up. But school's been really pulling me down and I really don't know why I've been feeling like this. It's really not like me to feel like that, but I think it's fair to say that Chinese New Year is to blame.

This is actually my first time ever to be spending Chinese New Year at home in Brunei. It's something. I've been making um-loads of money, and I'm not bragging, I'm just being honest with you. I've never seen so much ang pao in my life and it probably isn't as much as you' readers have ever had, but if I was to compare it to the amount of ang pao I've ever collected in Malaysia, this is like hitting the gold mines. In Malaysia, I'd collect Ringgit. Ringgit! That's double the currency of Brunei, which means it's half as worthy! So over here, it's just so much more.. how you say.. 'Lau Juak'! I actually have open houses to visit, other than my families. Chinese New Year in Brunei is pretty awesome :) It's legendary.

Yes. But, this festive season can be rather deceitful. What we see as a time to light our fire crackers to 'welcome the new Ox year' in, and to visit friends and relatives at open houses, to share food and drinks and give and recieve red packets - IS ACTUALLY A TIME WHEN WE PUT ON SO MUCH WEIGHT, PROCRASTINATE AND LEAVE WORK ASIDE BECUASE YOU HAVE TO 'VISIT HOUSES', LOSE A LOT OF MONEY FROM GIVING AND GAMBLING, and why do we call it the 'year of the Niu' when an Ox is not a cow :(

It's pretty confusing at the same time, but I love it! I love the atmosphere, I love seeing money, I love the disadvantages of celebrating Chinese New year - that's how much I love it! I realize that I had just contradicted myself very obviously, but what I had written in my last paragraph is so true. I'm telling you that even when it's decietful, people still come to love the outcome of it. People don't seem to care how much weight they put on, as long as they burn it off after (or maybe it's just me), they don't care how much moeny they lose through gambling because it's 'Chinese New Year'. I guess the whole atmosphere and the festivity of the occasion is so overwhelming, people take it as a chance to forget eveyrhting else. I suppose that's the beauty of celebrating in general!

Maybe that's why I've been dreading school and putting work off, because Chinese New Year in Brunei is so Pumpin'! :)

Something for you guys to look at: