Deepavali stalls , shopping and much more in Little India

I never blogged about Little India although that should have been the first post given the popularity of this place among Indians . I actually wanted to write in detail about this place but I never got the time to do so .

We end up going to Little India atleast once a month either for things which you won't find anywhere else or for the familiar food . Before going to India we went for a quick shopping for folks back home and hence this is going to be a quick and small post before we leave .

The streets of little India at this point is decorated with lights for deepavali . The decorations were in place one month before .
How can we not pay a visit to deepavali stalls specially set up for this occasion . But before going inside quench your thirst with some Thailand coconut .Here's naveen trying to eat every last bit of that delicious coconut.
The Diwali stalls are nothing compared to back home but hey you can't complain , people here atleast know what the festival is about. The stalls, with all thing Indian is colorful and yes crowded !!!!

It contains rows and rows of stalls of clothes and they are really beautiful but no trial :(
There are 3-4 mehendi shops . Some even advertised that the mehendi needs to stay only for 5 min to show up the color , usually it should be kept for atleast one hour .
These stalls have everything - clothes , shoes , mehendi , carpet ..... Except crackers .
Why so many carpets ??

There are no crackers . You know it's illegal to buy or sell them !!!!
The lanes of little India next to mustafa are pretty narrow . It's gets very crowded specially during weekends .
If you are a tourist and want to take back some Singapore souvenirs then this is the place to be . There are cheaper options also like the shop below where you have deals like 3 for 10 .
Whenever we go back to home we always take loads of chocolates and mustafa is the one stop shop for buying not just chocolates but anything .
The night view of the street .

Our fridge stuffed with chocolates !!! They are not for me although given a chance I would have had them all .

Deepavali , the celebration of lights

Deepavali ,also known as festival of lights is the biggest festival for hindus and is celebrated with equal enthusiasm throughout India. According to Hindu mythology Ramayana , the people of ayodya celebrated the return of their king Ram and Sita from their 14 yr exile after defeating the evil Ravana ,with firecrackers and Diyas (lamps) and thus Deepavali came into existence.The festivals marks the triumph of good over evil and effigies of Ravana are burned around this time in open grounds in many places in India.

What exactly is a mooncake ??

Mooncake sounds like an exotic name given to a sweet made of dough , lotus seed paste and egg yolk . It's made only during mid-autumn festival and the shops are filled with all shapes , color and sizes of mooncakes.

The way we exchange different dry fruits assorted in funky package during Diwali , people here exchange mooncakes during mid-autumn festival . They are either circular or rectangular in shape and are embossed with intricate designs on top .The shops here are stocked with them and equal importance is given to packaging. The better the packaging ,the expensive the mooncakes.

Mid Autumn festival

It's a popular harvest festival celebrated by Chinese and Vietnamese .People get together , exchange gifts and celebrate the festival with family .

The most prominent thing that stands out during this festival is lantern and mooncakes .I don't know the importance of lantern , they are everywhere - hanging by the streets , mass processions are held by people holding lanterns and it can also be seen hanging outside houses .

Are the ghost hungry ?? Sure they are it's hungry ghost festival

Second half of the year is a festive season in almost any part of world . There was hari raya , ganesh chaturthi ,next is mid autumn festival , Diwali and Christmas .

Although this post is late , hungry ghost festival ended in august but still better late then never .It's a Chinese festival and the major ethnic group here are Chinese so this festival celebration is pretty evident .

According to Chinese belief the gates of hell are opened during this time and hungry ghost will be set free and they will wander around earth . So in order to please them offering of food , fake notes , drinks etc are made .

And the offering are always kept outside so that the ghosts spot them and don't enters the houses to trouble the residents!!

The festival was celebrated now and then whole of previous month. Every other week we would see offerings like above near our blocks . And the best place to get a glimpse of such things is at the heart of the community centers and HDB .


I always see old and middle age folks burning the fake notes near this container(which are kept there throughout the year) , it's pretty obvious that the younger generation is not much into these kind of beliefs .

I assume this is also a part of the offerings . We were curious to try it out as we thought that it might be some new fruit but it felt and looked artificial so we backed out .

Then there are getai shows organized to please the ghost .They start building the tent previous night and next night we could see some traditional Chinese dramas . Well the one that happened in our block their were no audience !!!! Most of the people were busy eating which was also arranged as a part of whole show I guess .
 

We also saw that the front rows were always empty , it's only later that I came to know that those seats are for the ghosts . The getai shows are mainly organized to please the ghosts .

Gong Xi Fa Cai

Gong Xi Fa Cai is translated into "Congrats ! Get rich" in Chinese.This is how Chinese greet each other during this time of the year.

I know Chinese new year is over and I should have posted this long back but better late than never.

We got 5 days leave this Chinese new year out of which we spent 4 days in KL.But we could see the celebration way before the actual day.

Chinese New Year is the main festival here and this year its supposed to be year of rabbits.What that means I am not sure but its something like zodiac signs. Babies born in this year will be calm and soft natured according to Chinese.

The decorations had started in Singapore one month before. The whole city looked like a bright coloured candy.The spirit is something like what we have during Diwali.People exchange gifts ,meet their families and eat together.

The most prominent thing one could see during this time of the year is oranges and bright colored decorations.i am sure oranges signifies something to chines new year and they are called Mandarin oranges.We have this huge doubt why is it called mandarin oranges ?? mandarin is supposed to a language.

There are lots of money plants being sold and everywhere there are flower decorations. The government even has plans of calling Chinese New Year as Spring Festival.

Money reminds me of one thing-the Chinese obsession with gambling.What cricket is to Indians,Gambling is to Chinese.When we had visited Resort World Sentosa which boasts of a huge gambling center ,the entry fee for Singaporeans was 100 $ whereas for us it was free.Now I know why because it doesn't take long for obsession to become addiction.So the Government is trying to prevent its citizens from indulging too much into gambling.

Naveen was given two lottery tickets as a gesture for Chinese New Year by his company.He was told its part of tradition to give gifts like this.Anyway we were eager to check out the results and no prizes for guessing that we were not that lucky.

Now after a long holiday life is back on track.Ah..I detest getting up early in morning.

Gong Xi Fa Cai to all my friends here .

Our First Ganesh Chathurthi

Its was our first festival after marriage so we decided to celebrate it in a traditional way.

Being so far away from home in a new city has its disadvantages. for eg we had no clue how to perform the rituals.So we zeroed on the best thing we could do in such situation. Prepare a nice meal,wear new clothes and perform pooja.It turned out pretty good .