Monday 4 February 2019

Sleeping in a tent at Chinese New Year

We are still in Alor Setar, but had to leave our hotel because it is fully booked. Instead we are staying in a tent inside an original Chinese shop house just around the corner. Yes, it is a bit small and uncomfortable. Similar to the caravan in a warehouse from last year.
Today is Chinese New Year's eve and the lovely owner of the hostel, Zhi, has invited us to her traditional family meal.
In China it is often the only day of the year that the whole family get together and children travel many, many miles to get home to their parents. In this family Zhi's parents live almost next door, but their son has travelled here from Australia.
We had steamboat, which is where the food is cooked in a big dish at the table, and once it is ready everyone takes big spoonfuls of it before more food is added and the cooking starts again.
It could have gone very wrong, because as you know, I am not an adventurous eater  but it was really nice and we had lots of prawns, squid, pork and fish balls and tofu.
It was a great experience and we felt honoured to be included.
We have also been exploring the town and it has some great buildings....



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