I have been sharing some of my favorite angpow pieces on an angpow collectors group in Facebook and some members have been telling me to continue sharing my memorable stories and so I thought, why not write it down, that way, our kiddos can read about it when they grow up next time, eh?
For those of you who are not familiar or never heard of the words 'Angpow' (also known as 'ang pau', 'ang pao', 'angpau'), here is a quick definition:
Angpow = Red Packet (filled with cash inside) given during festivals
So for today's angpow story, it comes from this piece of lovely angpow:
Take a look at the picture of the man playing the big drum on the bottom left part of the angpow. I remembered one of my earliest encounter with lion dance troop at very close up (like 2-3 feet away) was during my school holiday time at my late mum's hometown.
During CNY, there will be a group of lion dance troop that will go from house to house to perform. They will do all the dance in front of each house's altar (my late popo was a Buddhist) and plucking and peeling the lettuce or orange and then taking away the angpow.
It was during the peeling process that was so thrilling as the lion dance was lying down still and quiet (with drums sound softly tapping behind mimicking your surprise heartbeat). I remembered few occassions where my cousins and I would be touching the lion dance costume and the head and was curious and excited at the same time.
One time, my cousins and I even tried to play the drum using tin can but was told by someone not to ever do that as there was a belief that whoever other than those in the lion dance troop who play the drums wrongly, is kinda like mocking the spirit of the lion or whatever (can't remember) and can even incur wrath and bring death to your ownself. I can't recall clearly what other details on this but needless to say, we stopped drumming for fear of dying and incurring the wrath of whatever/whoever...
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