Let's continue with part two!
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The street decor for 2014 was obviously horse-themed, given that the zodiac sign for the coming lunar year is the horse. Since the horse seldom deviates in shape, i guess it's hard to impress visitors except to throw us many, many horses and win in terms of "overwhelming numbers"!
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Disregard the wires using your imagination and you see many of them galloping in the air right above the historic South Bridge Road! Ironically, horses used to traverse upon the same road a century ago!
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It's a pity that the food street cannot open in time to coincide with the festive bazaar. I am not sure if i am the only one but don't you think many construction sites are facing delays nowadays? What has happened to the efficiency Singapore is well known for?
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Another picture of the horses which appeared as if it's just a matter of time before they are strangled to death by the red-yellow ribbons!
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Back to the bazaar again - as you can see, there were way more people and it was a little past 6pm! I can bet with you that the crowd would have been much large in the past two days with people taking leave and time off to prepare for the new year.
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More clothes! I actually walked upon the same street thirty minutes ago although there were just way too many things for me to lock my camera on! Sometimes, revisiting allows you to look at the same spot with a different angle, different perspective.
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Traditional Nyonya attire - i thought my mom would be a very pretty bibik if she takes to wearing Peranakan clothes but she insisted it would make her look fat!!
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Tiny, decorative figurines that served no other purpose.
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Above were the bigger versions. For me, i have stopped buying such items as they would likely be collecting dust on my table! I still prefer my practical piggy banks!
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Minions ang pow!
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Like aromatherapy!? Buy the essence and solution from this stall as they are having promotion! A shop in Northpoint selling the same brand was selling the air+ solution at S$15.90 per bottle!
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Horse-related decorations. Could you come up with auspicious wishes and greetings in Chinese that contain the Chinese character of "horse"? I can think of 龙马精神 (blessed with vitality), 马到成功 (succeed in whatever you do) etc.
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Horse plushies in various colours! Look closer at those at the back and you would realise this stall was still offering past zodiac animals for sale; for example, snake and dragon soft toys!
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Sampling for the Taiwanese yam mochi!
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Once again the Taiwanese products section; it's interesting that other countries products were gaining popularity and prominence when local products seemingly appeared to be taking a backseat in such big scale bazaars. Oh well, Singaporeans are fickle-minded when it comes to food!
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I unintentionally overlooked the fact that besides the king of peanut, there was also the king of gua zi (melon seeds)! Honestly you cannot blame me when both concepts were so similar!
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The dirty floor as a result of unstoppable sampling from almost everyone who walked past the shop! I think i should be able to satisfy my calorie count if i walk around the bazaar purely for sampling.
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In Singapore where selling, keeping and/or letting off fireworks without a proper permit is considered as a serious offence, we can only seek solace in pathetic products like sparklers and party poppers. Well, you lose some, you gain some.
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2 new pieces of T-shirt for S$5?!?!?!
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New year couplets for the house? I am always very envious whenever i see how beautiful the characters were written as my handwriting, regardless of whether it is English or Chinese, is simply horrible. They're so bad; i could not even recognise what i wrote at times.
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More clothing! Doubt they would be as cheap as 2 for S$5.
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Foreign children being taken on a tour of Chinatown! Maybe local school should also do the same since kids nowadays seem to be overly occupied with electronic devices like iPad and iPhone.
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The lanterns lining the streets might not appear much from far although i would suggest you take a closer look; they were definitely not as plain as you initially thought they were.
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Aren't these Japanese good luck charms?! I should hang a few right outside my room window. Hm... on second thought, i guess not since the wind can be pretty strong in my area.
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Maybe i should invest my money on these vacuum containers instead! At the very least, it means i can cut down my expenses by bringing home cooked meals to work.
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The main decorative display the Chinatown Chinese New Year Celebrations 2014! More on this impressive stallion later even though i believe you can read most of the background information online.
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Frankly, i found these coin-shaped lanterns to be relatively ugly and wondered if insufficient time has resulted in such unimpressive design. I spoke too soon of course.
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Queue for bak kwa was still manageable when i visited last Wednesday.
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The queue for Lim Chee Guan was much longer, as it has consistently been for as long as i remember. My sister's record was eight hours!
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Unlike the past, the store would now station someone along the queue to notify prospective customers that certain range of their products was already sold out.
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Maybe because the famous sliced pork bak kwa was already out of stock, the queue was not as long as i remember it could be a few years ago.
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These massive horses between New Bridge road and Eu Tong Sen street were more realistically placed; giving motorists the impression that they are running alongside the galloping horses.
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I simply could not resist going up to the high floors of Chinatown Complex housing block to take some photographs! I believe many avid photographers would reserve a spot along the corridor before midnight tomorrow. For all you know, i might be one of them!
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This gentleman drew damn well!
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The street was bustling with more and more people as day turned to night! The weather helped a lot as well since it was relatively cooling with a gentle breeze.
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I think mom bought something like this for the house. Sadly, the adhesive wasn't very strong and the bloody thing kept dropping off the wall!
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Small tangerines for sale at 5 for S$2; a bit too expensive i think.
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Dancing dragons and lions puppets! One of the pictures shall be my facebook cover page on the very first day of Chinese New Year!
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Yet another Chinese tradition; paper cutting! If i remember correctly, you can see a similar picture of this in past years' blog postings.
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Blur looking horses! Since Chinese New Year is a joyous occasion, i would love to have the horses with a smile that flashes their two rows of herbivorous teeth!
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Durians "tied" to a fake tree! A clever marketing ploy as it does attract a lot of attention!
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An alternative way to attract attention is to use a loudhailer or microphone to project your voice as far as you could to get customers to sample your products; in this instance, this man was asking people to try out his bird's nest jelly or something!
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Sampling is a must to get business! Even for me, i would not buy if i cannot sample. The only two exceptions to this rule are: someone asks me to buy for me and the products are priced much lower than what i perceived.
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Gigantic fortune cats! For now, my focus is still on pigs! Should you see one featuring pigs, please do not hesitate to let me know the location!
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Kopi Hock - my parents like this brand for its very nice aroma!
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More photographs of the streets when the sky was still pretty bright. Honestly, i personally feel that the lighting at this time was quite good for photo taking; there isn't any shadow and i don't need to compromise my ISO to speed up the camera's shutter speed.
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The illuminated horses looked so much better at night!
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Once again, let me present to you the star of Chinatown for the new lunar year; the stunning beauty which is gearing up for the arrival of 31st January 2014.
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For the third year running, students from the Singapore University of Technology and Design (SUTD) were given the task to design the street light-up for Chinatown.
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I could not quite remember the total number of horses that were crafted but it could likely be more than a hundred and seventy! This enormity might not be so apparent in the daytime so you might want to consider paying Chinatown a visit at night.
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A panoramic picture which has not been appearing much in recent weeks.
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Remember my remark i made just now about the coins being ugly? I am taking my words back as they did give many the image of golden coins dropping from the sky!
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No wonder so many people would taking pictures of them at night!
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Location of Bazaar
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Pagoda Street, Smith Street, Sago Street, Temple Street and Trengganu Street
Open Till When?
Till night of 30 January 2014 [Or 12.30 am of 31 January 2014]
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For Part One, Click HERE.