Archive for Spring Festival

Cap Go Meh in Muntilan

April 9, 2008 at 1:37 pm · Filed under Central Java, Spring Festival

Better late then never, I should write this article in February, but may be all of you had known that I was living in Bronze Age without internet for few months, lol. As I told you before, the Chinese Lunar New Year celebration is 15 (fifteen) days, and the day 15 is called Cap Go Meh (in Hokkian or Fujian dialect).

In Indonesia, the Chinese culture had been oppressed by Soeharto (the 2nd President of Republic of Indonesia) (1966-1998) so basically no celebration at that time. Until that suppressing law was reformed by Gus Dur (Abdulrahman Wahid, the 4th President of the Republic of Indonesia) (1999-2002).


In present time you’ll be able to see many celebrations at local temple. The picture above was taken at Fu An Tang (Mandarin dialect) or Hok An Kiong (Hokkian dialect) in Muntilan, the small city located in Magelang Regency in Central Java Province – at the middle of Yogyakarta city and Magelang city. Many Chinese or local culture will be performed each day until the Cap Go Meh evening.

Amazingly the participant is not only the Chinese or Sam Kaw (Three Religion) disciples, but even the local Javanese and Moslem was participating. And this is the real performance of Bhinneka Tunggal Ika or Unity in Diversity, the slogan written at Garuda Pancasila (the national symbol of Republic of Indonesia), I think. :D

Above is kind of cat or animal dance (I’m not pretty sure). The dancers were in state of trance, while their guardian (the man in black suit) incites a prayer in Arabic language.

And here is the ‘Liong Kui’ or Dragon headed Tortoise (Turtle with Dragon head). At the golden scale of the turtle, written name of donator. And if you see the gold money piece at the upper side – that is where the biggest donator’s name written. Personally I found out this Liong Kui was not sensational enough, not as sensational as the reported by Metro TV (one of the top and good television channel in Indonesia), which reported that the ‘Liong Kui’ is the biggest in East Asia.

At left below is the Dragon King, the Chinese culture believes that dragon kings rules the seas. The North Sea rules by North Dragon King, the East Sea rules by East Dragon King, and so on. (But I really don’t know which one is this guy.)

If you noticed the difference, above picture was taken at daylight meanwhile below picture was taken night.

And there was a Barong or Barongsai (Lion Dance) performance at night which caused the temple was really crowded by curious visitors. Most of them look to enjoy themselves, watching something which some of them understood and some of them not.

Last but not least, I do hope that this traditions will be repeated every year forever.

Happy Chinese New Year (Hey, this is the day fifteenth; you do not need to say the regards anymore by tomorrow). :D

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Chinese Lunar New Year

February 7, 2008 at 11:08 pm · Filed under Spring Festival

Gong Xi Fa Cai, today is 7th February 2008. A Chinese Lunar New Year, the celebration to welcome a spring in China. And it means a celebration for all Chinese around the world. Visiting families, giving ang pao / hung pao (red envelope) to kids (only married person is allowed to give), changing regards and of course a feast (mostly started one day before New Year).

But this year Chinese Lunar New Year means a lot different to me. Two years ago I lived in Tainan City, Taiwan, and I went to Taipei to celebrate. Last year I lived in my hometown Medan, North Sumatra, Indonesia. I was home celebrating with my beloved family and doing my obligation to visit the elders and friends.

But this year, I’m all alone here in Jakarta. I rent a room in Jakarta since 15th January 2008 at Petak Sembilan (Square Nine) near Glodok the old electronic market in Jakarta. And why was that? The only reason is that I need to take a break – stay alone and only alone to fight for better future.

Today I woke up at 6:30 and called my family in Medan at 7:00. After that I lit on my cigarette and took a shower after finished smoking. Then I changed regards ‘Gong Xi’ with other tenants. Then I got annoyed by one of the tenant who is a junkies – kept borrowing my cell phone to make a call to her eldest sister asking for money. God Mercy, I hope he can stop this bad habit soon, or he will surely damned.

At 8:30 I walked out in my new shoes – this is important for Chinese who believe new shoes means a tool to keep out bad guys at the year. But after 5 minutes walk I was all wet – thanks to the rain. At 9:00 I went inside the Indonesian cuisine (a common meal actually) warung (= small restaurant) and ate my breakfast. Chinese usually won’t spend money at the first day of New Year but what can I do as a single lonely man in a big city? I can only hope that the Magistrate of Good Luck (Chinese) or Lady Luck will give me much more in upcoming days than what I spend.

After that I went to internet cafe, spent an hour there playing RF Online and browsing, then went back to the house. There I saw something I never met before – so many pengamen (street singer/beggar) came into the house, they visited one house after one for small changes. I had counted 16 (sixteen) pengamen visited the house I live in two hours. The house owner showed me a box full of small changes she prepared for those pengamen. I had never seen this before in my hometown.

Then I spent few hours playing Rise of Nations on my laptop – ate lunch (hmm… nice grill pork) at house (the house owner was generous today, since food is not provided for tenant), spend few hours watching tv and talked to one of the tenant who came from mainland China. This China guy really impressed me, he came to Indonesia with his wife and son without an ability to speak Bahasa Indonesia (Indonesian language), he brings clothes, bags, accessories etc from China and sell it in Jakarta, as a street-hawker / street-trader, can you imagine that? I could never do that, and maybe you couldn’t either – imagine that, a foreigner without communication ability, working as a streethawker at a foreign country. What a brave man…..

And now.. It’s 23:43 already, a few minutes later and it would be the second day of the year. FYI Chinese new year celebration is 15 (fifteen days). :D And I’m still sitting infront of the computer, writing this blog and share my loneliness to all of you. But there is always hope, for a better day.

Good Night Indonesia

Note: A grammar correction will be always appreciated.

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