WAYCHOFFS IN SINGAPORE: February 2009

Monday, February 16, 2009

THAIPUSAM VIDEO

This is a video of some of the Thaipusam devotees dancing down the street to music. I hope you can watch it! See my Thaipusam entry below dated February 9 for an explanation.

Friday, February 13, 2009

My friend Donna and I went on a tour of what are called "Black and White" bungalows. Black and White bungalows were built during the British colonial days to suit the tropical climate here in Singapore. They have lots of windows with louvered shutters, high ceilings, wooden floors, and wide, overhanging eaves to keep out the tropical heat. They usually have big lawns with gardens and swimming pools, which is hard to find in land-scarce Singapore. Black and whites are usually rented from the government, and they are the most sought after housing in Singapore.

Obviously this is not a Black and White! This is a row of shophouses where we stopped for a coffee break.

This one was my favorite, inside and out. The yard was huge and had a great swimming pool. The shuttered windows were all open, allowing for a nice breeze.

This is the inside of the upstairs living area, surrounded by palms. It was tastefully decorated, and so inviting with lazy ceiling fans overhead.

I just had to take a photo of one of the pictures inside the Black and White. Here is a Chinese man smoking an opium pipe from long ago.

Took this picture outside at the base of a huge tree.

Monday, February 09, 2009

THAIPUSAM

The following pictures are very grotesque and not for those with a weak stomach! If you want to see it up close and personal, as we did, double click on each photo. I wish you could have been there to hear the music and the chanting as the people walked along Serangoon Road.

Thaipusam is an annual festival celebrated by Hindus to give thanks to Lord Subramaniam, the child god who represents virtue, youth, beauty, and valor. During Thaipusam, male Hindus who have made prayers to Subramaniam for special wishes must carry kavadis in gratitude. Kavadis are huge steel racks decorated with flowers and fruits and are held onto the men's bodies by skewers and hooks that pierce the skin. Devotees can be seen carrying Kavadis in a procession from the Perumal Temple at Serangoon Road to the Chettiar Temple at Tank Rd, where family members remove the heavy structures. For an additional spectacle, they will pierce their tongues and cheeks with skewers and hang fruits from hooks in their flesh. The walk is about 4 kilometres long and they walk barefoot or on a shoe spiked with nails the entire way. Such show of religious devotion requires spiritual preparation by fasting from meat, fish and chicken, and abstaining from worldly pleasures like sex, smoking and alcohol for several weeks before the festival. Women do not carry a spiked kavadis because they cannot expose their bodies to be pierced. It is reported that there is no blood and afterward no scars remain. There are only two places that celebrate Thaipusam in this fashion, and Singapore is one of them. (the other is in Malaysia)

They are carrying jugs of milk on their heads as an offering

This man has hooks in his back and another man is pulling on the ropes as they walk. OUCH!
The oranges are hooked into his skin.

If you look closely you can see flower petals between his feet and the nails

Double click on this photo to see the limes up close!

There were lots of children walking along the processional with their parents

Photo of a billboard in Little India

Although the festival was grotesque and bizarre in my opinion, the participants were chanting and singing and celebrating. There were peacock feathers and limes and oranges and flowers everywhere, so it was very colorful. Some of the devotees appeared to be in a trance-like state of mind. We had a scary experience when an Indian man in the crowd noticed us and became very belligerent, shouting at us and throwing up his hands, calling us "American bastards", telling us we should kill ourselves because India is going to rule, and he called himself a hero. OK, SCARY! We were very aware that we were not in Kansas anymore, as Dorothy would say. We kept quiet, didn't respond, and he eventually walked away with a bunch of onlookers staring at us. A nearby policeman told us the man was drunk. Needless to stay, we didn't stay much longer! And can I just say, that after witnessing such a bizarre ritual firsthand, that I am so thankful that I don't have to show my devotion to my Lord and saviour Jesus Christ in the manner that these people do?