Yeah! My favourite festive season of the year! Every year it's almost the same schedule for my family but it's still fun. Last year, I couldn't celebrate it so actually I wish to celebrate it this year.

It's a season where I meet all my cousins and play with them once again. All of us have grown up. It seems hard for us to find them to gather together. So now, it's a chance for us to make an effort to come together.

Our Chinese New Year is all about food, food and more food! Gambling, gambling and more gambling! Haha.. don't worry, we are not gambling addicts, it's just a chance to gamble for fun. I don't gamble to win. I gamble to enjoy the game with my cousins and family. The feeling of getting everybody to meet up is really nice.

Eve's eve, our house had most of the furnitures replaced. Eve, we had our first steamboat in the house with our new induction cooker. Different from previous years, this time we had our cousins with us. On the first day, I wore my bright pink "cheongsum" to visit my relative homes. Usually, we had relatives coming but this year, we made a change. On the second day, as usual I had to visit the temple for blessings then we head off to my aunt's house. She prepared a lot of food and yummy chicken wings for us. At night, I head off to a barbeque. Third day, we had a big house gathering. Guests, food, wine, cards and beer filled the house. My mum made many cups of pudding for everybody for the first time.

I enjoyed it very much. Really wish that Chinese New Year Holidays can last for 1 whole week.. hehe.

Recently, I feel that my family have transformed. My mum seems to treat me so much like her daughter (which it didn't seem so previously). My dad seems to treat my mum more lovingly in front of us. My mum seems to accept the loving behaviour from my dad now (I never saw that before). We are like a family now!

Spending time with my family nowadays seems to be a pleasure and not a pain anymore. I used to have unhappiness staying with my family especially my mum. Now I love them and they love me.

Having meals at home with mum is really a time I treasure now. Perhaps only one time in a week, I could taste my mum's cooked food. Being able to eat what my mum cooked made me realise something. No matter how bad our mum's cooked food can be to other people, it can never be compared to anybody outside. We tasted our mum's cooking from young, there's always an inner craving to eat certain dishes that our mum cooked for us. Even if it's just steamed egg! You know that it tastes different and it was cooked in our mum's unique style. The same dishes cooked by others will never taste the same. Talking about my mum's cooking, now I feel like drinking more of her herbal soup, dark pig trotters, braised duck, fried vegetables with soft mushrooms, soya sauce steamed egg and more!

Food really does show you the bond.