Saint Wicked
In the Catholic calendar, the 1st of November is All Saints' Day. A day of obligation. A big feast day where all the saints throughout the ages who have done the will of the Lord are remembered and celebrated. Though all good Catholics would aspire to be saints, obviously not everyone is canonised as saints. But fret not, the average joe of souls is also celebrated in a different feast day known as All Souls' Day, which is celebrated one day after, i.e. the 2nd of November. Think of it as a Qing Ming of sorts where people flock to the cemetery to offer prayers and bless the graves of our dearly-departed.
Like every year (for the past 10 years already), my family and I travel to Teluk Intan for All Souls' Day. We'll get on the PLUS highway and make our way for Bidor before reaching Teluk Intan via a trunk road. This year, we left al little earlier-- at 7:00am actually. We could have left earlier if I had actually managed to darg myself out of bed. My mum rapped on my door at 5:30am! I just rolled back into
bed! I slept at 1:00am the night before and I was really pooped due to some "naughtiness" on my side and my flaring sore throat.
The trip up was quite uneventful except for an accident on the opposide side of the highway. A Peugeot had turned turtle. The car didn't seem damaged but I don't think that would had been case if it was a Proton. Heh. We reached Teluk Intan at around 9:00am and had our breakfast at Jalan Maharani. Surpisingly, most of the good stuff were already sold out by 8:00am. Don't these people know how to sleep in on weekends?! As usual, I didn't get to eat lai fan-- a thick meehoon that is indigenous to Teluk Intan.
Anyway, we managed to stuff ourselves with curry noodles, glutinous rice with curry prawns, kaya-butter toast and the famous Teluk Intan chu cheong fun. It's kinda like the HK version, but it's spotty because they put in stir-fried sengkuang and dried shrimp. It is eaten dry with preserved green chillies. It's very good and can't be found elsewhere. After buying flowers, fruits and roasted pork at the market, we made a bee-line for the St Anthony Church Cemetery where my late-dad's buried. After finishing the prayers, we went off to buy some fresh-ly baked biscuits from the Sin Joo Heong factoy nearby.
Next stop, my maternal uncle's place. Did some catching up with him. Glad to hear that most of my cousins are doing well in university and in their work. As usual, we left with his delicious homemade buns and pau. Then we visited my paternal aunt. Met the newest member of the family-- Melina. Cute little tyke. Spent quite some time there chit-chatting and having lunch. Had the weirdest old lotus root soup -- with wolfberry, longan and big dates! Like drinking tong sui! Didn't stop by at Sungai Besar this year as my maternal aunt was off gallavanting in China (no chance to borong back some fresh fish!).
Before leaving Teluk Intan, we ta-pau 35 pieces of chu cheong fun from the Sam Siew Yeh factory. They use a short assembly line where the flour mixture is poured into a tray and subsequently sprinkled with the savoury items and mechanically pulled through the steamer via a conveyer belt. At the end of the line, someone rolls up the sheets. Semi-automatic. Looks dirty, but hey, it tastes darn good! We reached KL at about 8:00pm after a slight delay due to a very serious accident on the opposite side of the road (fortunately). A bus and several cars. All burnt up. The highway was backed up nearly 5km by our reckoning.
Stopped for dinner at the OKR-Taman Desa steamed fish head shop. Arrived home exhausted. But then, I didn'y do any driving this year. :P. Thanks dear brother-in-law! A comfortable ride in their new Avanza. And I had my brother's Nintendo DS Lite to keep me company. Hehe. Until next year...
PS: BTW, what happened to the group All Saints?
Like every year (for the past 10 years already), my family and I travel to Teluk Intan for All Souls' Day. We'll get on the PLUS highway and make our way for Bidor before reaching Teluk Intan via a trunk road. This year, we left al little earlier-- at 7:00am actually. We could have left earlier if I had actually managed to darg myself out of bed. My mum rapped on my door at 5:30am! I just rolled back into
bed! I slept at 1:00am the night before and I was really pooped due to some "naughtiness" on my side and my flaring sore throat.
The trip up was quite uneventful except for an accident on the opposide side of the highway. A Peugeot had turned turtle. The car didn't seem damaged but I don't think that would had been case if it was a Proton. Heh. We reached Teluk Intan at around 9:00am and had our breakfast at Jalan Maharani. Surpisingly, most of the good stuff were already sold out by 8:00am. Don't these people know how to sleep in on weekends?! As usual, I didn't get to eat lai fan-- a thick meehoon that is indigenous to Teluk Intan.
Anyway, we managed to stuff ourselves with curry noodles, glutinous rice with curry prawns, kaya-butter toast and the famous Teluk Intan chu cheong fun. It's kinda like the HK version, but it's spotty because they put in stir-fried sengkuang and dried shrimp. It is eaten dry with preserved green chillies. It's very good and can't be found elsewhere. After buying flowers, fruits and roasted pork at the market, we made a bee-line for the St Anthony Church Cemetery where my late-dad's buried. After finishing the prayers, we went off to buy some fresh-ly baked biscuits from the Sin Joo Heong factoy nearby.
Next stop, my maternal uncle's place. Did some catching up with him. Glad to hear that most of my cousins are doing well in university and in their work. As usual, we left with his delicious homemade buns and pau. Then we visited my paternal aunt. Met the newest member of the family-- Melina. Cute little tyke. Spent quite some time there chit-chatting and having lunch. Had the weirdest old lotus root soup -- with wolfberry, longan and big dates! Like drinking tong sui! Didn't stop by at Sungai Besar this year as my maternal aunt was off gallavanting in China (no chance to borong back some fresh fish!).
Before leaving Teluk Intan, we ta-pau 35 pieces of chu cheong fun from the Sam Siew Yeh factory. They use a short assembly line where the flour mixture is poured into a tray and subsequently sprinkled with the savoury items and mechanically pulled through the steamer via a conveyer belt. At the end of the line, someone rolls up the sheets. Semi-automatic. Looks dirty, but hey, it tastes darn good! We reached KL at about 8:00pm after a slight delay due to a very serious accident on the opposite side of the road (fortunately). A bus and several cars. All burnt up. The highway was backed up nearly 5km by our reckoning.
Stopped for dinner at the OKR-Taman Desa steamed fish head shop. Arrived home exhausted. But then, I didn'y do any driving this year. :P. Thanks dear brother-in-law! A comfortable ride in their new Avanza. And I had my brother's Nintendo DS Lite to keep me company. Hehe. Until next year...
PS: BTW, what happened to the group All Saints?
Comments
And good God, how can you not know All Soul's Day!!
Iyo ko? Alamak, malunya....
@Ah Bong:
Haha, you katolik ke?
@Savante:
Haha. How does the the Saint WIcked's prayer go?