SHHK Family Day 2009

Yesterday, we spent about 4 hours at the Singapore Hokkien Huay Kuan Family Day 2009 held at the Singapore Expo. CP was with us.

As WY and his 文化艺术团 troupe had been scheduled to perform at the event, the teachers arranged for transport from TP to the Expo. So, WY arrived at the venue with his 文化艺术团 friends. We managed to catch him for a photo but the grumpy boy was looking so glum that I think it's better not to share the photo here.

Once we were inside the hall, we proceeded to collect our goodie bags. Oh boy, they were so heavy! But fortunately, they were no longer backpacks (which was what was given out at the previous SHHK Family Day).

After that, R went with WF for his 'longkang' fishing while CP and I looked around, lugging the 5 bags with us. Initially, we felt a little 'lost' because we didn't know where to start from. Then, CP caught sight of the stall with a gigantic 'Provision Shop' (杂货店) decor!

So, we joined the snaking queue and collected some 'old-fashioned' titbits like preserved olives (橄榄), 三渣饼, 'Marie' biscuits and 'satay fish sticks'! These titbits certainly brought back some memories.... Believe it or not, they even offered the 'Ken-Ken' brand of cuttlefish! Also, check out the Milo tin on the pulley behind the shopkeeper!



As we moved off from the 'Provision Shop', we were offered some 'tikam' games, too. CP collected one token whilst I managed to tikam 10 of them!

Then, as we shoved some of the goodies into the bags, CP and I went on to try games at the other stalls. We tried out some 'simpler' games and won for ourselves some more tokens. We also tried our hands at some of the special stalls which were focussed on learning about the Hokkien culture and specialties. Even at these stalls, we managed to win some tokens.



The hall was not exactly crowded that day, so whilst we moved from stall to stall and area to area, we spotted R and WF, and WY and his friends, at the various stalls, too. Everyone seemed to be having fun one way or another! WF couldn't miss his favourite (yes, still favourite!) train ride. The older boys sure looked hard at how WF had aimed at the Catapult station!



There were some other games which looked familiar - Hopscotch! And Pick-Up-Sticks! (using canes, leh!) And also some other dice-throwing game on the floor. And many others, which I didn't photograph anyway.



As we approached 6pm, CP and I started to feel a little tired. And hungry. And thirsty. So we decided to exchange our tokens (we had a total of 81 at that point in time) for the small gifts (mainly food such as Meiji biscuits and a can of Coke because all of those for 60 or 90 tokens - see 1st 2 photos - had already been snapped up).



Then, we proceeded to redeem our food coupons. R and WF also joined us. We had steamed yam cakes, fried rice and some soya bean milk. We rested our feet and arms at the table. CP went about taking some photos of the food area.



Later, we went closer to the stage because WY's perfomance was about to start. He and his troupe performed a dance; a smaller group of the members also performed a 快板comedy. But the video clips are too big a file, so cannot upload here. This is a picture of part of WY's group (he wasn't in this photo).

In the meantime, WF located his friends and started to play with them, running around and laughing heartily. CP and I sat and watched the rest of the concert while R and WY (who had re-joined us) checked out the stalls for redemption of the remaining coupns and tokens etc. I also gave R our tickets to check if any of them had been picked in the lucky draw.

R was gone for a long time. When he returned, he shoved to us an envelope which read '67th Prize'!! So, we had won $50 worth of NTUC vouchers! Not bad, hor?

The concert went on for some time and then concluded with the lucky draw for the top 10 prizes. Then, with the conclusion of the lucky draw, we also bade some fellow-文化艺术团-parents goodbye and left the hall, feeling tired but happy nevertheless.