2009 Wesak Day

This year Wesak Day, was celebrated on Saturday, 9 May 2009.

I brought along my mum to the Siamese temple "Wat Siribunya Maggarama" at Jalan Tambun, Ipoh for early prayer to avoid the crowd.

As a norm in Wesak day, all devotees will bathe the Buddha!

Then we went over to the Tibetian temple "Enlightened Heart Buddhist Centre" at Tambun, Ipoh to pray and to participate in the "Carry Buddha" ceremony.

This is Mum first experience and she was glad that she participated in the Carrying Buddha ceremony. As the ceremony needs to walk around the Budhhist Centre, i'm worry whether Mum can finish the ceremony. However, she did it and commented that even though she was tired but did not felt the Buddha behind her back!

After the ceremony ended, we joined the Devotees for some vegeterian food and wait for the next ceremony scheduled at around 12.00 noon.

There are some devotees offering small bottles of oil for burning to get Buddha's blessing, while some offering candles.

At around 12.00 noon, the ceremony to bring out the South East Asia biggest Buddha Mural (60m by 12m) for the Sun ' bathing' has begun. The mural was heavy and needed a minimum of 20 strong guys to carry it out from the temple to the temple outdoor carpark. Yours truly in one of those strongman to carry the Mural. Children and ladies are prohibited to carry the Mural.

Upon taking out to the carpark, the Mural was slowly rolled out and to soak in the Sun. According to the practise, the Mural will draw power from the Sun once a year. Devotees will run under the mural to receive Buddha's blesssing. After 15 - 20 minutes out in the Sun, the mural was rolled back and carry back to the temple.

Wesak Day @ Enlightened Heart Buddhist Centre, Tambun

19 May 2008 was Wesak Day, a public holiday in Malaysia. Buddhist throughout the world including Malaysia celebrating Wesak Day, a day to commemorate the birth, the enlightenment and the passing away of Gautama Buddha.

For this year, i was at the Enlightened Heart Buddhist Centre, a tibetan temple located at Tambun, Ipoh to celebrate the Wesak Day.

Devotees carrying little Buddha waiting for the ceremony.

High priest in costume and mask performing the prayer.

Tibetan monks playing the ceremony instruments.

'Drying Buddha' ceremony i.e devotees unfurling a giant canvas measuring 60m x 12m, the longest canvas painting of Sakyamuni Buddha in South East Asia, out in the sun to dry.

Devotees entering the Dragon head to get rid of all sins.

Merry Christmas

Merry Christmas & a Happy New Year

Deepavali lunch @ Manjit's House

http://www.flickr.com/photos/47997523@N00/1917292596/, originally uploaded by See Teck.

Today is a public holiday in Malaysia for all Malaysian to celebrate Deepavali festival, a festival of Lights.

We were invited to our neighbour house to have Deepavali lunch.

Penang 2006 Oktoberfest

The first Oktoberfest took place in 1810 to celebrate the marriage of Crown Prince Ludwig and Princess Therese of Sachsen-Hildenburghausen. The first Oktoberfest in Penang was organised by the Malaysian-German Society in 1973!

The festival is to celebrate cosiness, the notion of belonging, social acceptance, cheerfulness, the absence of anything hectic and the spending of quality time in a place not too large, well heated and nicely furnished, ..eh... cosiness.. Everybody sit together without any social barriers, talk to each other in a relaxing manner, have some good food and nice drinks to enjoy the day off with beautiful music and dance.

I attended the first Oktoberfest in my lifetime, yesterday at the Malaysian-German Society. The signature to this event is the ever popular Oktoberfest Song, Ein Prosit, ein Prosit der Gemuetlichkeit. Immediately after the song, everybody will shout aloud, oans, zwoa, gsuffa (in Penang, follow by a long 'yum seeeeeeeng'!) and takes a big gulp of beer.

Lots of good German food i.e sausages, meatloaf, pork knuckle, sauerkraut and not forgetting the beers and wines. Entertainment was provided by a 6 piece German band, Inntaler Musikanten with their 'oomph-pah-pah' songs, dances and games! In fact this is their 15th visit to the Society.

Grand Seaside Send-Off

The Nine Emperor Gods festival were celebrated for 9 days since last Sunday, October 22, 2006. The festival held in the ninth lunar month of the Chinese calender, is dedicated to the 9 sons of the Godness of the North Star. The Godness is said to control books of life and death!

The temples are thronged by devotees, burning joss sticks and praying for blessing!

During the 9 days festivals, yellow flags were decorated near the temples and plenty of makeshift stalls around Georgetown offering all sorts of prayers paraphernalia for devotees to offer to the gods!

A lot of vegetarian stalls are put up, dishing out various type of vegetarian food to cater for the devotees whom become vegetarian for the whole 9 days...

The celebration ended on Monday, October 30, 2006 with the grand send-off of the Nine Emperor Gods. There were processions with decorated flower floats and a sedan chair carrying the sacred urn and the yellow Emperor's Boat to the seaside.