CNY Holidays!

Recently we had a long break due to the Chinese New Year festivities.. I love Chinese New Year.. it's the season to drink, eat and gamble.. when else can you participate in all these vices and have an excuse to do it? 

Chinese New Year Eve
Every year for the past 4 years (or was it 5?), our family heads down to a family dinner at Toh Yuen (Hilton) for a family reunion dinner.  Not much of a reunion since we see each other every night for dinner at home.. haha.. but it's always nice to get out of the house and be served by others and have a night of fun and chatters.. 
Then it's home time when we exchange Ang Pows (us unmarried ones waiting eagerly) and then we wait til 11.55pm to set off the firecrackers and fireworks!  I'm not sure how this happens but each year, it seems that I'm delegated to light the shortest fuse for the firecrackers!  That's why I'm sorta fearless now when it comes to lighting the crackers.. and I'm always the one lighting the fuse for the fireworks!  I love it when midnight strikes.. when the night skies get illuminated with the bright sparkles of the fireworks, when the air is permeated with the sounds of boom from firecrackers being lit to scare off evil spirits.. 
We let go 3 firecrackers and 5 fireworks that night... before finally calling it a night and drifting to sleep amongst the boom boom bang!

1st Day of Chinese New Year
We always have an open house on the first day of Chinese New Year.  That's when everyone is invited to our house for lunch..  I love entertaining people.. although when it gets busy.. I tend to hide in the comfort of the bar area (NOT drinking.. just having a barrier between me and the people!) and chat to the few who came to hide out there with me.. hahaha..
Pigging out on all the food because today is NO PALEO DAY!  YES! I had permission from Muscleman to go off Paleo for that one day!
After our house 'closed' for the evening, we headed out to Aaron's place.. he has this beautiful mansion on top of the hill overlooking Kuching.  That's when things got messy.. with the combination of too much alcohol and not enough food.. but I had a great time there!  I had a great conversation with MuscleMan and it was nice.

2nd Day of Chinese New Year
This is when we pay back visit to those who visited our open home on the first day of Chinese New Year.  This year, we visited 8 houses from 10am to 4pm... OMG were we exhausted by the end of it.. I was happy collecting Ang Pows (yes.. I still get them!) but it was hard not to binge on food, especially since I was on the Paleo diet again... once we got home, I took a half hour power nap, had a shower and was off to Johnny's house at 5pm for his open home party.  That was always fun.. loads of booze and food..and great company.
I left at 12am.. and then started the drunken walk from home to Justin's house for gambling.. I didn't last very long.. and had to be accompanied home (I insisted that I was alright to walk home alone) but ahhh... another great way to end the day.

The first two days are the most important days for Chinese New Year in our family tradition.. by the time it came to the third day, most of us were just enjoying the holidays and going off doing our own thing.  

Me, I started training for my 5km fun run on 23rd February 2013.  Muscleman has offered to run with me, and it's going to be a challenge because I'll be running the entire 5km.. no more running 1km and walking 4km.. I'm challenging myself and giving myself a run time of 45 minutes or less.  So hence the training begins...