The Spirit of "Gong Xi Fa Cai"

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I got dragged to the city to follow my Mom do some Chinese New Year shopping. But no, that was not the dreaded part. The most dreadful part was having to sit for an hour in the hair dresser's cause she wanted a hair wash-cut-blowdry before the new year comes. :(

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THEN, we went to do some shopping. Headed to Chinatown and I hate going to Chinatown cause it's hot and dodgy, and salespersons there have absolutely loudspeaker voice, and totally no manners, saying the most inappropriate things, and making funny "whistling" noises. But wow! This trip, it was slightly different.

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First and foremost, the place looks wayyy better now. With covered walkways, and cleaner roads. (Maybe I was there early, before the rubbish starts to accumulate). And to my utter surprise, the salespersons were actually quite nice and courteous. I think it's because they thought I was a tourist. (Yes, they mistaken me for a Korean. Which part of me looks Korean, my gosh!). But nevermind, since I get special treatment, I guess I could be Korean for a day :) Hehehehe.

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Oh look. Pomeloes!! I haven't seeen those in ages! For those of you who haven't tried it before. It's like a hugeee orange, with heaps of pulp inside, and it tastes absolutely yummy! The only trouble is, you can't peel it like peeling oranges. The skin's rather thick. So you've got to like, slit it open with a knife, and then peel along the grooves. (Okay, I don't think my description's very good. Don't blame me if you can't get through to the fruit. Hehehe)

Mom bought lotsa fruits! :) Yes, we're all fruit junkies!!! Hehehe. I got to eat my "jambu air" (Sorry, can't remember what it's called in English) :( YumMmM.... and oh, we bought this new fruit as well! Translated from chinese characters to English as "the Imperial fruit". It kinda looks like tiny pears. And it's damnnn sweet! Yummm, I likeeeee.. ( wanted to post pics, but I just realised that I've gobbled down all of them).

And hey, Chinese New Year ain't complete with some flower decorations at home. :) Scouted around for my favourite pussywillows! And to my amazement, they come in lots of colours now!! (The original's white, for those who don't know). Pink, red, yellow, blue, lilac!!! Wowwww.... howwww pweeeeettyyyyy...

Headed to the Curve and Tesco at night, to get some CNY cookies. I don't know why, but dad seems to have a fascination for the cookies there. He bought some from The Curve last year, and according to him, they were absolutely yummy *shrugs*

The CNY decoration @ The Curve Shopping Mall

Went into Tesco and got a shock of my life!! There was a crowd around 12 midnite, and we blardee had to wait to get our shopping trolleys!! Can you believe that??? Don't they all need to sleep and get up to work the next day?!? What are they doing?? shopping in the middle of the night! Wow!!! I haven't seen that in a longggg timeee!

The Chinese New Year spirit is sooo alive here!! I absolutely love it! I'm so glad I get to spend this auspicious day back home, with my family (Yes, I was stuck in Melbourne last year, cause class started early). It's times like these that you really wanna be home! Besides the fact that the city never sleeps!