PINEAPPLES FOR PROSPERITY?

But before we get to humongous pineapples, here is a flower that resembles a bird

when it is in the budding process. Magnolia liflor - a flock of birds to welcome Spring. Spring Festival or Chinese New Year is celebrated today, year of the Ox, the second of the 12 Chinese zodiac signs.

Shops have put up their pineapple deco weeks ago.

I am always in awe at how much bigger the pineapples get every year. 

    In the Chinese Hokkien dialect, pineapples are called "ong lai."     Ong" (prosperity, luck, fortune) "lai" (coming).  So hanging pineapples for prosperity is a play of words which the Chinese are very fond of. I am not so keen on huge pineapples hanging in my porch, 

so eating pineapple tarts for "ong lai" is close enough. 

But for assurance, I have pasted the good luck Mandarin character "fu" on my front door. 

 Fortune, good luck blessing,

 ALL COME IN PLEASE. 

"FU" in capital letters in English isn't exactly a blessing. Isn't it amazing how languages can have such different meanings and give rise to much misunderstanding! 

This "fu" comes with the Chinese God of Wealth and Money - "Caishen." We have a very popular song for CNY that is blasted repeatedly - "Caishen Dao," Money God has arrived. 

And yet another "fu" but with a FISH. Another play of words from the Chinese. 

In Mandarin, the same pronounciation can have many meanings - homonyms. This is the reason why Mandarin is a difficult language to study. The character fish is pronounced "yu" which rhymes exactly with "yu" which means surplus/in excess. Thus, the fish symblolises "nian nian you yu" which means abundance and surplus every year. 

 Peonies and 

any flowers in red or gold is accepted,

 including clothes. All black is a big NO NO, reserved only for funerals. Here is my Mandarin class mates having our Chinese New Year lunch, 2020.

We had our reunion dinner 

last night. Only the three of us. Opps... four of us since the man of the house

 (Thory) sat himself at the table while we were still getting stuff from the kitchen.

Xin Nian Kwai Le (the mandarin character is "chun" (Spring).