Pure Feng Shui

Happy New Year 2023 to all readers of this blog.  While New Year's Day has been celebrated at the stroke of midnight on December 31st 2022, the Lunar New Year celebrated by Chinese people all around the world is yet to come.  We are in the final month - Lunar Month 12th , month of Gui Chou / Water Ox in the Chinese Luni-Solar calendar. Traditional Chinese Lunar New Year will be celebrated on 22 January 2023, while Spring Begins / Li Chun starts on 4 February 2023. 

南懷瑾首次承認！我當年也“犯太歲”，但我用這個方法化解了！2023年前一定要知道！ It is that time of the year when the talk of "Tai Sui" 太岁 heats up in traditional broadcast media and social media here in Singapore. As the year comes to an end and a new year comes in January, it is common for people to feel a sense of anticipation and anxiety over what is to come in the new year.  The Chinese luni-solar calendar do not use numerals like in the international Gregorian calendar, but assign Tian Gan Di Zi 天干地支 to each year, resulting in a pair of "element" and "zodiac sign" for each year. For example 2022 is the year of the (Yang) Water Tiger and 2023 will be the year of the (Yin) Water Rabbit . This results in relationships between the signs, for example Tiger zodiac sign clashes with the Monkey sign while Rooster clashes with the Rabbit . In 2022, those born in the Monkey years are said to be in a clash with reigning sign of the Tiger in 2022. There are a few types of clashing relationships amo

春节 2023 / Spring Festival celebrations are coming soon next month in January 2023. The traditional Chinese Lunar New Year Spring Festival has 15 days of celebration. In multiracial and multicultural Singapore, it is allocated 2 days of public holidays. On mainland China, it is an important homecoming event as most people head back to their hometown （家乡）from working in the big main cities or overseas. The first day of the Chinese Lunar New Year falls on 22 January 2023, which is a Sunday and so the following weekday is allocated a public holiday. Monday itself is also a public holiday and so Tuesday is allocated a public holiday, making it a long holiday weekend of 4 days here in Singapore.   The eve of Chinese New Year is in itself an eventful day, as it is the final day of "Spring Cleaning", and the final touches are made to prepare the home and office premises to welcome the new year. The dinner on the eve of the new year has special cultural significance in the Chinese

7th of December, Wednesday is the changeover day, from Hai / Pig month to the month of Zi / Rat. In the Chinese luni-solar calendar, there are 2 months to go before the next year of Gui Mao / (Yin) Water Rat starts. In the international calendar, it is the last month for the year 2022. The social mood of people is focussed on the festive year end period celebrating Christmas Day and New Years Day.  In 2022 Singapore went from COVID-related pandemic lockdown restrictions to the country fully opening up. Quite a change in circumstances. Singapore citizens are free to travel abroad again, depending on their destination countries' restriction. Air fares for the Christmas festive period in late December and for the Chinese Lunar New Year period in January are already at their highs.  An important date in the Chinese festive calendar is Winter Solstice or Dōng Zhì that falls on 22 December 2022. Besides being the mid-month Solar Term marker, it also marks a Yin/Yang transition, as Yin re

When looking at the 24 Solar Terms of the Chinese calendar, it will be helpful if you distinguish between the Five Elements Qi of the Solar Terms in the calendar, and the Qi of the Five Elements of actual physical nature in real life. It is only at the geographical location around the Northern latitude marker of the Tropic of Cancer that we see a close sychronicity between the calendar and the weather.  Elsewhere on the earth globe, like at the Equator where Singapore is located, we only experience a tropical weather system with just 2 types of seasons - "Hot" and "Hot and Wet", locally influenced by tropical monsoons. In contrast, the temperate countries experience the 4 seasons.  The Five Elements Theory is applied to the Chinese calendar system and also to nature, and it is important to not mix up the two and infer that both have to, or will be the same.  Metal Dog month starts: 8th of October, 2022 from 15:22 hours Mid Point of the month: 23rd of October, 2022 f

The calendar "Autumn" season started on the 7th of August, 2022 at 20:28 hours. The solar term to mark the beginning of the month is "Autumn Begins" or Li Qiu.  In this particular month of the Chinese Luni-solar calendar, there are clashes of elements on both the Tian Gan (Heavenly Stems) and Di Zi (Earthly Branches) levels, between the month and the year: Year Heavenly Stem / Tian Gan : Water Month Heavenly Stem / Tian Gan : Earth Water X Earth (clashing relationship) Year Earthly Branch / Di Zi : Tiger / Yin Month Earthly Branch / Di Zi : Monkey / Shen Tiger x Monkey (clashing relationship)

We have already moved into the second month of the year of the Water Tiger, Ren Yin 2022 in the Chinese luni-solar calendar on 5 March 2022 .  The beginning of the month is marked by the Solar Term " Jin Ze " or translated as " Awaken Insects " that started at 22:43 hours on the 5th of March, 2022.  In the Chinese luni-solar calendar , the 60 sexagenary pairs sequence alternate on a Yin - Yang - Yin - Yang basis, and so while February was a Yang Water Tiger month, March is a Yin Water Rabbit month. April will be Yang month again, and so on and so forth.  The elements of the month are Water (癸 Gui / Yin Water) and Wood (卯 Mao / Rabbit). You may be wondering why the name Jin Ze / Awaken Insects was used to name this second month. The ancient Chinese observed the natural phenomena in their surrounding environment. It was observed that insects were beginning to awaken from their winter hibernation, and hence gave this name to the second month . It is useful to note

Five Tigers - 5 Elements Tigers 壬寅，甲寅，丙寅，戊寅，庚寅 The popularity of the annual Zodiac sign predictions reaches its height during the Chinese Lunar New Year period. They are simplified readings to cater to the masses as the whole population is grouped into twelve Zodiac signs; which means that hundreds of millions share the same reading per sign. Too general to be precise, and so it is infotainment. In modern days, the annual Zodiac sign readings serve a largely commercial purpose as many capitalist business entities use the predictions as marketing and promotional events for news and publicity. Temples and religious organisations use them as annual fund raisers. Historically these readings were done by scholars working at temple fairs as a side income while waiting to take the Imperial Examinations in the ancient cities of China.  The annual Zodiac signs predictions are simplified to twelve, which is already quite lengthy to write and talk about. To bridge the gap to the actual 60 Jia Zi

From preparations for the Chinese Lunar New Year, to the final 15th day of the festival celebrations, at least 3 to 4 weeks of a Chinese person's calendar is dedicated to this festive event. Although the public holidays declared is only 2 days here in Singapore, there are many other customs and traditional practices that take place before and during this festival. It is an important event in the Chinese calendar.  The meaning of the word 元宵 comes from 元 as in the first (month) and 宵(night). The timing of this event moves to the evening as it is the 15th day of the first lunar month, and that means it is a full moon night. And being practical and appropriate for the night time darkness, lanterns are used to light up the night. In English, this day is also called the Lantern Festival. One of the traditional games is finding answers to riddles attached to the many lanterns.  This is our very own Chinese "Full Moon Party".  It also marks the end of the festivities for the Lun