Everybody's birthday

Last Wednesday here in Singapore we celebrated "everybody's birthday" I understand that the 7th day of the Chinese New Year is the birthday celebration day. As a result, the team and I (about 14 people) went to a very traditional Chinese restaurant in Chinatown. I must point out that I was the only non-Asian person in the group (in fact, in the whole restaurant that was sitting about 300 people).

This restaurant is in the seventh floor of a building and its style is art deco from the 60's. It looks like a ballroom with some food stands. In them, there were some "displays" of cooked animals: Whole roast duck (including head and eyes), an entire pig and an aquarium with fish ready to be cooked.

Out first dish was something that sounds like "Low Hey" It consists on raw fish with something that looks like small fortune cookies and dry noodles. The interesting part is that it is served without mixing it at the center of the table. Then the whole group "cheers" by wishing a prosperous New Year while throwing the Low Hey high in the table. The idea is that the higher the food is thrown, the more prosperous the year will be. This practive is quite messy but people enjoy it nevertheless. These are some of the delicacies I tasted (in addition to the raw fish): Boiled sea cucumber (a marine worm the size of a cucumber), shark's fin soup (although I made a polite point about the practice of kiling sharks only for their fins), USA fried duck and white moss dessert. As I have already mentioned, sometimes it's better not to ask what it's been served to avoid unpleasant suprises.