The lunar new year is a huge event in Singapore and like many Chinese all around the world, it is celebrated for the first fifteen days, most of which are sessions after sessions of visitations to the houses of relatives and friends!
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Another popular activity is to visit the temples and the first one i went to was the well known Loyang Tua Pek Kong, which moved to its current premise in 2007.
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I had been to the temple countless times but i have never encountered a time when the open space next to the temple was converted into a huge carpark to accommodate devotees! There were even traffic marshals engaged to direct traffic!
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A few highlights were installed to celebrate the start of the horse year; one of which was this gigantic status of the fortune god who is always a great favourite among Chinese.
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It's a pity the statue wasn't given the mechanical component to sprinkle gold paper with 4D numbers. If it does, i can guarantee a much bigger crowd surrounding it and waiting patiently for the papers.
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Many people are curious on how they would fare in the horse year and you can find out via the panels that were sorted according to the animal zodiac sign you fall under!
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My fortune (i am a Monkey) seemed to be quite bad for career and wealth. :(
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For the benefit of my Indian friends, you can share this with your family and friends borne in the monkey year! Sorry i was unable to take pictures of the write up for the other zodiac signs!
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Aim for good luck by ringing the bell using any coin you might have in your pockets. A fool proof way to beat the system is to change A LOT of coins and throw them all at the same time!
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Panels lined the narrow road that led motorists to the temporary car park. I thought they were just for decorative purposes and provided a different "view" for drivers like myself.
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They were photo backdrops!! I cannot understand why the committee would want to place them so near to the main ingress / egress to the car park! Tsk tsk tsk, no sense of safety consideration!
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I mentioned one highlight just now. The other one came in the form of two living things in front of the big vertical banner (featuring galloping horses) to the left of the above photograph!
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Two live horses!!!!!! Oh my god, that's so bloody appropriate for the horse year and maybe that's the reason why there were so many people on the night i visited!
The Chinese character for horse is 马. The Chinese character for on is 上. The Chinese character for money is 钱. Those two aforementioned characters, when place side by side as in 马上, mean immediately.
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Hence, the Chinese came up with their own symbolic interpretation by literally placing money on the horses (马上有钱) which can be translated as "immediately have money"!
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Entering the main temple compound! I can so imagine the size of the crowd that stopped by the temple on new year's eve and it would definitely be a lot more than what you can see here.
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A bigger table was even set up to accommodate the expected increase in praying items!
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Devotees lighting up the incense sticks. The temple has "ten" stations in total with each station commanding a patronage of one to five incense sticks.
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What i totally didn't expect was the long queue of devotees, with their hand grasping a thick bundle of lighted incense sticks, trying to get in! Environmental activists would not be happy to see this sight.
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The internal section housing the central altar would likely have a PSI that exceeded the record Singapore experienced last year. Air pollution aside, it was the smoke that frustrated me; i was tearing quite badly!!
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Another two pictures to show how bad it was!
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Tua Pek Kong statue! From my understanding, this deity can only be found in Southeast Asia, mainly in Singapore and Malaysia. You may check out the wikipedia page for more information.
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Regular visitors to the loyang tua pek kong would know what this is for. Those who are unaware might have waved it off as a stone with no value and wonder incredulously why someone would put a stone on a pedestal.
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Unlock its secret by purchasing a special incense and placing it right in front of the stone. Take a step back and observe. For those lucky ones, they would be able to see numbers appearing against the rough stone surface. What is the use of those numbers? Buy 4D or TOTO lah! The stone is supposed to be very efficacious!
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There is another way to strike it big although it is not as effective; vandalise the poor horsey by writing down the numbers you wish to be the winning numbers for the next lottery and then, pray.
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Pray really, really hard.
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Location
20, Loyang Way
Directions
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Once you exit from Tampines Expressway to Loyang Avenue, drive straight and turn left once you see adoring lights enticing you to do so.
Note
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I believe (no, i cannot guarantee) the live horses and gigantic fortune god statue would stay until the 15th day of the horse year which means you would have 14th February to catch them at Loyang Tua Pek Kong temple!