Chinatown Street Light Up (Daytime) for Lunar New Year 2025 - Year of The Snake & the CNY Bazaar @ Singapore #yearofthesnake

Happy Lunar New Year! I was so busy these few months (with work, travel etc) that I clean forgot to upload the photographs taken  on 12 January for the annual Chinatown street light up and bazaar for Chinese New Year! 

Well, it's never too late since technically, today is only the second day of the year of the snake and the street light up could last till 27 February 2025, although the bazaar had already already ended by now. Nevertheless, good to blog for memory purpose.

Sadly, the beginning drizzle started turning heavier after I was done with my teriyaki chicken rice set from Kazan Japanese Cuisine at Chinatown Complex Food Centre. Now, being an amateur photographer, seeing the rain isn't a happy thing. 

The rain tapered a bit when I reached the main centerpiece; lucky! 

Centrepiece zodiac animal; the slithering snake! Known to be the most sinister among the twelve zodiac animals, it's impressive that the designers can come out with such a cutesy snake that exuded adorable beauty! 

Said to be 8 meter tall and part of this installation called the tree of fortune, the golden snake appeared much smaller at maybe about 3 meters tall, and all lonely. 

Even the snake banner adorning the facade of Yue Hwa Chinese Products was bigger! 

Due to the rain, I didn't venture much to the back of the tree of the fortune to check out other snakes. But maybe given the shape of a snake, with no limbs, I think it's quite hard to portray them in different forms. 

As usual, I would proceed to the best spot to shoot top-down photographs of the Chinese New Year centrepiece; People's Park Centre! But something was amiss with all the barricades.

Damn; the prohibition to take photos and videos. Frankly, I am wondering if section 447 of the penal code would hold in this instance if the object of photo-taking and videography is not within People's Park Centre. 

Back on ground to check out the CNY bazaar.

Hardly any customers given the rain. 

Under the shelter of my light, trusty umbrella from Tokyo Hands, I continued my crusade to see what's on offer. p.s. I almost bought the standing piggy banks! 

Wall decorations in the images of snakes, and cats. 

To be frank, the snakes don't look right.

Snacks on sale! Aside from the common Taiwanese mochi, jelly, peanuts, melon seeds, I noticed vegetarian options like buckwheat flake, pumpkin chinese yam chips, flaxseed chips etc.

The standard long line of new year cookies / snacks! I remember one year when the prices were heavily discounted on the eve of lunar new year, and I bought a ton! A lesson learnt though as it's obvious we overbought! 

This organic dried persimmons were really good, and they came from either Korea or Japan. Prices are reasonable and sampling is a must for you to decide which "country" is better for your taste buds.

My favorite stall; every year you would see me there buying a few kilograms of phoenix melon seeds and peanuts for my mom! I always look out for the uncle who was wearing the pair of black slippers with red sole! 

Happened to check out the Tai Chong Kok nian gao. Gosh, prices seemed to have gone up a lot! Back in 2019, the price of a medium was just S$14.80, and it's now S$22.80?! Darn the inflation.

Finally, the rain lightened a bit.

But, I was already going to leave. 

Video taken of the rainy weather. Although I did notice a cameraman taking footages of the street scene, I didn't realize I was actually shoot, with Alex exclaiming that he saw me while watching the news later at night!