Chingay Parade

The annual Chingay Parade, organised by the People’s Association (PA) — a statutory board under Singapore’s Ministry of Culture, Community and Youth — has been a part of the country’s Chinese New Year celebrations since 1973. Over the years, the parade, which features various cultural performances and dazzling float displays, has become an important celebratory event that showcases Singapore’s diverse and cosmopolitan culture. Usually held on the second weekend of Chinese New Year, the Chingay Parade once featured more than 10,000 performers in its biggest show.

Processions described as “chingay” (derived from a Hokkien term) can be traced back to the 19^th century. It is generally believed that immigrants from China brought this religious custom of taking deities on processions to British-ruled Penang and other parts of Malaya. According to old newspaper reports, Chingay processions were also held in other parts of Malaya such as Kuching and Johor Bahru.

Deity processions in the early years

Such deity processions were a common sight in Singapore in the 19^th century. Besides Chinese temples, the Hokkien and Cantonese communities also regularly held large-scale deity processions.¹One of the earliest newspaper reports of such activities was published in May 1833, when a reader complained about noise from a Chinese procession along the Singapore River on a Sunday morning and the following Tuesday afternoon.²

Another English-language report, published in April 1840, described a grand parade and ceremony by Thian Hock Keng temple to welcome the statue of the Queen of Heaven: the sea goddess Mazu. The report vividly described ornamental platforms (taige), which were among the main features of those processions. At the time, groups of girls aged five to eight — dressed in a variety of Tartar and Chinese costumes — were paraded on elaborately decorated ornamental platforms carried by hand. It was a spectacle which attracted much attention.³ In modern times, these ornamental platforms have been replaced by floats.

In December 1906, Singapore’s Hokkien community decided to discontinue deity processions, as they considered them crass and a waste of money, and preferred to use the money saved for educational purposes instead. Other dialect groups made similar decisions.⁴ However, processions with ornamental platforms were still held on special occasions or celebrations, such as those organised by the Chinese community to welcome members of the British royal family to Singapore, and by amusement parks for commercial purposes.

Origin of the name

In the 19^th century, English newspapers typically used generic terms such as “procession” or “religious procession” to describe these deity processions. This changed in the late 1870s, when English newspapers began to use transliterated names, such as “chiangay” and “ching-gay”, to describe them. Eventually, Penang settled on the term “chingay”, which spread throughout Malaysia and Singapore and is still used today. In the early 20^th century, “chingay” was used in English newspapers in Singapore and Penang to refer not only to large-scale deity processions, but also to non-religious processions involving ornamental platforms.

It was not until 1974 that the term zhuangyi (妆艺) appeared in Chinese newspapers. Previously, descriptions such as zhuangban gepeng (decorated platforms), yingshen saihui (ceremonies to welcome deities) and tideng youxing (lantern processions) were used to describe deity processions or processions involving ornamental platforms. In fact, the Chingay Parade was first known as qingyi, before it was renamed zhuangyi the following year. This showed that the Chinese term zhuangyi appeared much later than its English counterpart “chingay”. A Malay dictionary published in the late 19^th century also included the word “chingge”,⁵ indicating that the term first came into the lives of the people as a dialect word.

The term zhuangyi is generally believed to have originated from the Hokkien dialect word tsng ge (which sounds like “chingay”), and is likely to be based on the Zhangzhou Hokkien accent. The Chinese-English Dictionary of the Vernacular or Spoken Language of Amoy, published in 1873 by Xiamen-based missionary Rev. Carstairs Douglas (1830–1877), contained the noun tsng-koh, which means “an ornamental platform with young girls (or boys in this character) on it, carried in idolatrous processions”.⁶Its Chinese characters are zhuangge (妆阁), which means ornamental platforms. The dictionary also states that tsng-koh in the Xiamen Hokkien accent and tsng-gE in the Zhangzhou accent are synonyms.⁷The fact that “chingay” from the Zhangzhou accent has appeared in the English and Malay languages in Singapore and Malaysia is probably related to the community of Zhangzhou businessmen in Singapore.

Modern-day Chingay Parade

There has been a ban on the use of fireworks and firecrackers in Singapore since 1972 for public safety reasons. In the absence of crackling firecrackers during Chinese New Year, the festive atmosphere became somewhat less lively. The following year, at the suggestion of founding Prime Minister Lee Kuan Yew (1923–2015), the PA and Singapore National Pugilistic Federation (now known as the Singapore Wushu Dragon and Lion Dance Federation) organised the first Chingay Parade to celebrate Chinese New Year. The procession, which was broadcast live on television and involved about 2,000 performers, started at Victoria School in Jalan Besar and ended at Outram Park. It was led by a float with a statue of a bull to signify the Year of the Ox, and featured traditional Chinese performances such as southern and northern lion dances, dragon dance, stilt walking, flag performance, a unicycle act, Chinese opera The Iron Rooster and Teochew drumming and music. Since 1974, Chingay has made its way into public housing estates, such as Toa Payoh, Queenstown, Marine Parade and Ang Mo Kio.

The Chingay Parade has long incorporated other ethnic and contemporary cultural elements to showcase the multicultural nature of Singapore’s society. As early as the second Chingay Parade, non-Chinese elements such as Disney cartoon characters were featured. Since 1976, the PA has also invited Malay and Indian performing groups to participate in the parade. By the 1980s, Chingay had become an annual celebration that Singaporeans and tourists alike could look forward to. In 1985, Chingay moved to Orchard Road, where it was held for the next 15 years. In 1987, it welcomed its first overseas performers; and in 1990, the first nighttime Chingay was held.

To mark the new millennium in 2000, the Chingay Parade was held in front of the former City Hall building that year, signifying the transition of this cultural event into the new century. Chingay then returned to Chinatown and Orchard Road, before being held annually at the F1 Pit Building since 2010 (with the exception of 2021 and 2022, when it was held online due to the COVID-19 pandemic). Since 2008, Chingay has adopted a different theme every year, to add depth to the performance, showcase the talent of local artists and encourage public participation.

Given the historical significance of Chingay in Singapore and Malaysia, the two countries will be jointly nominating the Chingay Parade onto the UNESCO Representative List of the Intangible Cultural Heritage of Humanity in 2025.