There are few things as romantic to me as the Mid-Autumn Festival that takes place in Malaysia every year between the months of September and October. The festival is also celebrated in a handful of other Asian countries including Taiwan and Vietnam - not to mention mainland China, where it – and many other things – first originated. In fact, the Government of the People’s Republic of China, in all its august authority, has recently declared the Mid-Autumn Festival, also known as the Mooncake Festival, an “intangible cultural heritage” - a sentiment I could not agree with more.
If you were to ask me why I feel the way I do about this festival, I probably wouldn't be able to give you a coherent answer. You might, however, catch me babbling about the times my cousins and I would stray to the nearby neighbourhood park at night after our inaugural family dinner, traditionally held at my grandmother's old terrace house in Petaling Jaya. The house was modest to a fault; its only defining features being the massive mango tree that overlooked its gates and an old porch swing that the dog was perpetually chained to. It'd wag its tail and eye us expectantly as we'd pass by, making our way into the brightly illuminated interior of the house where we'd proceed to stuff our faces that fleetingly resembled each other’s. After that, once we got to the park, we'd light lanterns and try to incinerate leaves and twigs in the darkness, fascinated by the dancing flames as our neolithic forefathers once were. My uncle would observe us remotely, wearing down time with the eroding tip of his cigarette - a lingering artifact of his own subdued pyromania - before guiding us home once we'd had our youthful fill of fun and fire.
To be honest, I don't think this nostalgia is due to any one thing in particular, but rather a whole laundry list of seemingly insignificant factors that collide and combine in certain ways to produce a childhood that smells of light and warmth and laughter - or maybe it wasn't all that special. Perhaps you could've given me a few measly crumbs of cake or some dried up leaves and a lighter to play with and I'd easily be just as nostalgic and sentimental about the whole affair. Perhaps it's just the warped lens of memory that bends to my desire to believe that the past was beautiful - my longing for elsewhen and elsewhere that transforms pumpkins into carriages in order to transport me there - wishful for a distant star to align my sights and steer my yearning.
If you were to ask me why I feel the way I do about this festival, I probably wouldn't be able to give you a coherent answer. You might, however, catch me babbling about the times my cousins and I would stray to the nearby neighbourhood park at night after our inaugural family dinner, traditionally held at my grandmother's old terrace house in Petaling Jaya. The house was modest to a fault; its only defining features being the massive mango tree that overlooked its gates and an old porch swing that the dog was perpetually chained to. It'd wag its tail and eye us expectantly as we'd pass by, making our way into the brightly illuminated interior of the house where we'd proceed to stuff our faces that fleetingly resembled each other’s. After that, once we got to the park, we'd light lanterns and try to incinerate leaves and twigs in the darkness, fascinated by the dancing flames as our neolithic forefathers once were. My uncle would observe us remotely, wearing down time with the eroding tip of his cigarette - a lingering artifact of his own subdued pyromania - before guiding us home once we'd had our youthful fill of fun and fire.
To be honest, I don't think this nostalgia is due to any one thing in particular, but rather a whole laundry list of seemingly insignificant factors that collide and combine in certain ways to produce a childhood that smells of light and warmth and laughter - or maybe it wasn't all that special. Perhaps you could've given me a few measly crumbs of cake or some dried up leaves and a lighter to play with and I'd easily be just as nostalgic and sentimental about the whole affair. Perhaps it's just the warped lens of memory that bends to my desire to believe that the past was beautiful - my longing for elsewhen and elsewhere that transforms pumpkins into carriages in order to transport me there - wishful for a distant star to align my sights and steer my yearning.
Part of me wants to think in those terms and reject these feelings as emotions unearned, but some other part of me truly does believe that it was real - or at least some of it was - and that the good times don’t necessarily have to be fabricated. More likely, I’ve chosen to forget about the less memorable aspects and decided to focus on what I loved best about the occasion – namely being with family and setting fire to things – birthing wildly skewed recollections. I suppose I’m still stuck between disregarding the past completely and being unable to let it go - revisiting it in my head over and over again, each time romanticizing it with revised fictions. But I suppose it can’t be helped, since humans have always been suckers for a good fantasy, particularly if it comes with a public holiday.
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