One day, a Dragon King held a banquet,
inviting every imaginable fish there was.
They all gathered in his palace and ate and drank until they were
full. Everyone was having such a good
time until something happened. There was
a drunken hair-tail fish was swimming here and there, swinging its tail, and he
accidently hit the King in the eye, blinding him.
The King was furious. “Bring before me every fish with a tail immediately,” he ordered the crab and the lobster.
The sudden change in the mood of the
party frightened everyone and they ran away.
The crab and lobster searched and searched for the fish with a tail, but
they failed to find even a single one.
Feeling very foolish, the crab and
lobster went ashore in search of the fish.
Finally, they came across a ditch between two rich fields. They heard someone crying, so they followed
the sound and found a big toad.
“Why are you crying so sadly?” the
crab and lobster asked the toad.
“Is it true that the Dragon King
ordered every fish with a tail to be brought before him?”
“Yes, that is true. But what’s the matter with you? You don’t have to worry. You don’t even have a tail.”
“Of course, I do not have a tail, but
it reminds me of the time when I was a tadpole.”
Today is Chap go meh, the last day of CNY, 15th
day of the first lunar month in 2013. We
got invited for the Lion Dance troupe and breakfast in the corner restaurant of
Putra Heights. It supposed to start at
9am, so we went before 8.30am…in my usual Korean time psyche…But it started in
10 am!!! Malaysian time psyche…after all these years, I am still not
getting used to this huge time-gap between two countries…
Anyway, we had a
good, loud crackers’ explosion plus very colorful lion dance plus…simple
Chinese foods and roast goat (instead of roast pork, because afraid to offend
the earth god of the restaurant, who could be Muslim or Chinese…, that’s the
explanation I heard…) But, I partook some oranges only. After seeing all those crackers busting all
over around the foods on the ground, though they are covered by banana leaves…I don't really feel like eating them…
After that, I went to the Korean temple in
Ampang. Their prayer starts at 10am and
it is 40 minutes drives if no traffic.
Luckily the road was clear all the way to allow me 90 km/hr speed… still
arriving barely before their prayer finish... At least I could enjoy their Korean
vegetarian Chap go meh dishes and catching-up-chats with the temple friends. Since I move to Putra Heights in January
2008, it’s not easy to go over their temple now. Of course I wasn’t regular even before
that. Out of blue moon…I will drop by
over there, like once every year or two…but whenever I go there, I get to release some of my homesickness.
It’s already my 16th year in Malaysia…and
it was the first time in 21 year (added my US years) that I got to eat Korean-Chap-go-meh
food!!! Our food of the day is a-5 grains rice and 5 kinds dried vegetables, traditional
rice cakes and fruits…and it was very nice and happy meal though so much
simpler in looking and taste than Chinese dishes.
Today, I felt like the toad of the story remembering
my tadpole days…there was no King looking for the fish with a tail, nor I was
crying with the sadness. But then, after
all these years…I am still finding the Korean foods suit me better over the
Chinese foods…I guess no matter how much I look like a Chinese in my outlook by
now, my inside is still very much a Korean, so is my English with Korean accent.
Anyway since the long Chinese New Year celebrations
is finally over now, I wonder whether I could expect familiar faces returning
to the Yoga studio…to lose all the extra pounds from the CNY…
