NEWS
Why Reunion Is More Than a Dinner
On the evening of 25 February 2026, Nanyang Succession Centre of Excellence (NSCE) together with Manor 33, co-hosted the inaugural Grand Reunion Dinner with intentional return to family, to heritage, and to the rituals that anchor us in a globalized world.
Across China reunion is no small matter. Each Lunar New Year, 9 billion journeys are made annually as families cross cities, provinces, and borders simply to sit at the same table again. Highways swell, train stations overflow, and airports become temporary homes for travelers carrying gifts, stories, and expectations to sit at the annual reunion dinner.
Closer to Singapore, the Causeway between Johor and Singapore transforms into a river of headlights every Chinese New Year.
All for a single purpose: to return home and have a meal together.
A Taste of Shanghai
For the evening’s hosts, the gathering carried personal meaning.
Dave Qian, co-founder of Manor 33 and a native Shanghainese, together with Melvyn Goh, co-founder of NSCE, envisioned the dinner as more than hospitality. It was a way to recreate the spirit of reunion many families remember from childhood.
Melvyn himself had spent more than sixteen years living in Shanghai. And many of the guests who have spent considerable time in Shanghai but now making Singapore-home. That shared connection inspired the evening’s culinary centrepiece: “A Taste of Shanghai.”
Dish by dish, guests were served home-style Shanghainese cuisine carefully prepared to evoke the warmth of family kitchens. The flavours were simple, nostalgic, and deliberate where food meant not only to nourish but to remember.
Because sometimes a single dish can carry decades of memory and thanks to Dave that created an off the menu experience.
Reunion- A Family that Eats Together Stays Together.
Every family preserves its history differently. Sometimes it is written in photographs and heirlooms. A recipe prepared the same way for generations.
A greeting spoken in a dialect younger family members may barely understand but cherish.
During the evening, families greeted one another in a remarkable tapestry of languages and dialects—Shanghainese, Fujianese, Sichuanese, Chaoshan, Guiyang, Cantonese, English, and Hainanese. Eight families sat together around, each carrying traditions shaped by different regions and family conversations. As stories flowed between courses, a simple truth emerged:
Succession is not only about passing down wealth. It is about preserving bonds and belonging. A family that eats together stays together.
The Opening.
The evening opened with welcoming remarks from Dave, who described Manor 33 as a place where new immigrants from China setting in Singapore can call Manor33 their second home. .
A video message from Dr. Zhang Xu Wei, President of the Nanyang Institute of Management, followed, highlighting the growing importance of family continuity in an age when mobility often separates generations.
Melvyn then introduced the mission of NSCE: to create spaces where families can discuss succession not only in terms of capital, but also values, trust, and shared identity.
Because wealth may transfer quickly. Values take generations.
Where Children introduces their parents
One of the evening’s most memorable moments came during a simple exercise. Instead of adults introducing themselves, children introduced their parents.
No titles.
No professional achievements.
No business credentials.
Just the voices of their children.
One by one, the next generation stood up and spoke—sometimes shyly, sometimes confidently—about the people who raised them. The exercise reminded everyone present that succession begins not with legal structures or financial planning, but with something far more fundamental:
Recognition that they are important in the lives of adults.
Knowing where we come from. Honoring those who came before us.
Celebrating Hui Chun – Nanyang Style
The evening’s keynote reflection was delivered by rising generation, Ms Low Sok Leng, who chose a familiar Lunar New Year tradition as her starting point.
She spoke about Hui Chun挥春—the red spring couplets placed on doors each year during Chinese New Year. Every year, new words appear on fresh red paper. Yet the meaning remains the same: blessings for prosperity, harmony, and renewal. Reunion dinners, she suggested, work in much the same way.
Families do not gather because nothing has changed. They gather so that change does not make them forget who they are.
One Big Table
As the evening continued, families shared their own reunion traditions—some elaborate, others quietly simple.
One spoke about dishes that must be cooked exactly as a grandmother once made them. Another described gatherings where three generations sit together, even if only once a year.
Despite their differences, every story carried the same spirit. Reunion is not merely a celebration of the past. It is an act of remembering forward.
The most meaningful exchanges of the night did not happen at the podium. They happened between courses, over shared dishes, in the spontaneous laughter that fills a room when strangers begin to feel like extended family. That was what The Grand Reunion was meant to be where instead of listing individual names, the table cards were labeled by family surnames.
True to NSCE’s ethos, the gathering emphasized authenticity over formality, trust, openness, fun and shared humanity.
Closing the Evening with Eight Treasures at the Table
As the evening drew to a close, guests gathered for a final photograph—children and parents sitting side by side after a night that felt both festive and reflective.
The meal ended, as tradition often does, with something sweet: Ba Bao Fan (八宝饭) (Eight Treasure Rice), a dessert long associated with Chinese New Year. Beneath its glossy surface of glutinous rice lie eight treasured ingredients—red dates, lotus seeds, nuts, and dried fruits—each symbolizing prosperity, abundance, and happiness for the year ahead.
Like the dessert itself, the evening was made meaningful by the coming together of many elements—family, tradition, laughter, and memory. And so, to all our guests and to everyone reading this article, we wish a year filled with joy, good health, and togetherness — a year as rich and sweet as the treasures within Ba Bao Fan.
Because when the dishes are cleared and the lights grow softer, what remains is not the banquet, but the quiet warmth of family gathered around the table.
Beyond Wealth, Toward Meaning
At the Nanyang Succession Centre of Excellence, the belief is simple but profound:
Succession education must go beyond capital. Families must also learn how to preserve culture, confidence, and connection across generations.