Losing our traditions

端午节 is coming soon. Prices of the glutinous rice dumplings have already started increasing. I noticed that our chinese festival always seem to be related/associated to some kind of food. Some of the traditions/culture that our ancestors brought over from China years ago had evolved over the years to become more of a Singapore thing.

新年 - 肉干，pineapple tarts, etc (think its more of a Singapore thing)
端午节 - glutinous rice dumplings
冬至 - Tang Yuan
中秋节 - mooncakes

My maternal grandmother used to always wrap the dumplings herself during the 端午节 period when I was still in lower primary. My relatives, cousins and I will then gather at her house on one of the Saturday. When I entered the house, I would see her sitting in the kitchen, busily wrapping/preparing the dumplings. That scene is now still very vivid in mind. And of course, I always enjoy the eating part, hahaha.

But sadly, she doesn't do that anymore. Partly due to her getting older, and wrapping dumplings is a tedious job. You have to prepare the fillings, chop the meat, cook it. Then come the diffcult part, wrapping the rice, the meat into a neat pyramid using leaves.

I thought wrapping rice dumplings will be a fun activity for the whole family, but the preparing process probably puts us off.

Interestingly, there is a "粽子” entry in wikipedia.

les