chinese wayang at lorong sinaran

chinese wayangs were much more popular then. today, at the wayang site, the number of performers easily outnumbers the number in the audience.

i always looked forward to wayangs when i was a boy. that was when our curfew would be extended - we could return home at around midnight. it was not the wayang performance that attracted us. it was the fringe events. there would be stalls lining the road to the wayang site and they would be selling a range of things, including food. there were also games stalls where you could indulge in tikam-tikam.

we did watch the wayang, not throughout but bits of it here and there. so, we know that the good soldiers wore red and the bad ones wore green. when someone was riding a horse, he would be waving a stick in his hand and he would be skipping along instead of walking. the evil ones usually had their faces painted black.

we liked going to the back of the wayang stage to look at the painted faces and to admire the pretty performers in their elaborate costumes. there was excitement in the loud noise created by the drums, the cymbals and the other musical instruments used in an opera.

the one that was staged at our neighbouring kampong, lorong sinaran, was a teochew opera. i have watched hokkien opera at dunlop street and hainanese opera at lincoln road, about 1.5km from my kampong.

come to think of it, i was an opera fan.