collect key

[kelvinlau76]

I just collected my new house key and thanks to this great website, i follwo the guidelines to '1st time collect key items'
and now the question is,
1. what do i do with the fruits? fao gao? pineapple?
2. what do i do with the spreaded rice/green bean? can i sweep it?
3. lastly , can the fruits (grapes, orange, banana etc) be eaten?
thanks in advance for any kind great advices

[Cecil Lee]

Dear Anon,

Frankly, there is no hard-or-fast rule, here.

The procedure that you had done is non-religious and if we disect it; the procedure is about placing wealth into our homes.

In Singapore, majority Chinese dialect group is made up of Hokkien (from Fujian provicince) approx 22 percent of all Chinese in Singapore. Thus it is common practise to roll in a pineapple and buy fa gao. Teochews also have nearly this procedure.

Other procedures include the placement of fruits four corners and centre has more to do with the Cantonese dialect group where the Cantonese are concerned with the 5 spirits of the home e.g. 4 corner spirits of North, South, East, West and Centre spirits or the 5 spirits.

Coming back to your question:

In Singapore, there are different state of renovation/ non-renovated homes.

For example, even in a HDB or housing board flat, we have new uncompleted flats where flooring is not done, yet to premium flats and condos or resale flats where often the floor tiles are done up.

Thus, often, if your home is totally uncompleted e.g. the living room and bedroom floor is simply cement screening with lots of dust on the floor then naturally, one may not want to wash the fruits (after three days) of placement and eat them.

Thus, the natural thing is to throw them and the fa gao away.

Sometimes, we have ants, and other insects e.g. cockroaches crawing on the floor and for hygene purposes, we have no choice but to throw the fruits away!

For some homes e.g. condos, where the floor is clean and fruits laided out... and if some of the fruits are still in good condition, why not or no issue in eating them later.

Thus, as mentioned above, once the ritual has been performed, there is no hard and fast rule as what to do with the fruits there after.

If possible, do not give them away. As it is not a matter of being selfish but rather, giving them away is like giving away wealth! Thus no choice, best to throw them away.

Warmest Regards,
Cecil

Anonymous wrote:
I just collected my new house key and thanks to this great website, i follwo the guidelines to '1st time collect key items' and now the question is, 1. what do i do with the fruits? fao gao? pineapple? 2. what do i do with the spreaded rice/green bean? can i sweep it? 3. lastly , can the fruits (grapes, orange, banana etc) be eaten? thanks in advance for any kind great advices

[Cecil Lee]

Dear Anon,

As mentioned in the procedure:

1. It is best to leave the sprinkled rice and green beans for three days. And afterwards, no issue to sweep them away and the remainder - wash the floor.

2. Thus, for example if today is a Wednesday i.e. on a Wednesday we had sprinkled rice and green beans then we should not wash or clean or sweep them after Friday. Thus on Saturday onwards we can sweep the floor.

3. For those who purchased a new housing board flat with just cement screening then... we may not need to remove the rice and green beans as later on, this small amount may be cement screeded and tiles laid on top of it.

4. The above procedure was fine tuned. As for info, previously some Chinese do sprinkle an addition of tea leaves and salt! BUT WAIT! For those who have purchased a home that has especially mable floor ing laid and parquet wood tiles.. it may be hazardous to sprinkle tea leaves as if the leaves were stained by water.. it may leave very nastly tea leave stains on the floor! And salt can be very acid to parquet wood tiles.

5. Thus, the current procedure takes into consideration all these issues!

Warmest Regards,
Cecil

[kelvinlau76]

hi thanks for the reply. 1. My house is premium flats, eg. with flooring & tiles. so, 1. will sweep the rice/green bean away. 2. see if the fruits are eligible. thanks. btw. I'm a cantonese, regligion: taoism. what other things should i do? and also, i heard must put 'stove'? since we new hourse got no stove yet. thanks again

[Cecil Lee]

Pictures of sprouting green beans...

Quote

On 10/4/2006 6:26:13 PM, Anonymous wrote:
language=javascript
postamble(
);
hi thanks for the reply. 1. My
house is premium flats, eg.
with flooring & tiles. so,
1. will sweep the rice/green
bean away. 2. see if the
fruits are eligible. thanks.
btw. I'm a cantonese,
regligion: taoism. what other
things should i do? and also,
i heard must put 'stove'?
since we new hourse got no
stove yet. thanks again