Qing Ming Easter

So I see from facebook posts and from overhearing conversations that Chinese People are doing their Qing Ming, hahng san, grave sweeping. visiting the graves of their ancestors. In my case it would be my parents. I didn't grow up doing this. My dad's ashes were kept right in the house, and then my bedroom. Which I later found out, according to my Sifu, was bad feng shui and would give me bad luck. Even though Han Chinese are supposedly one ethnic group, various villages have their own rules for customs. Some villages just clean the grave site with water. Most Taishanese bring offerings of roast pigs and cooked chickens, the organs still there, as offerings, and wine and incense and paper money, and cakes, and they eat it right there at the gravesite, often accompanied by firecrackers and even drums and lion dance if it is available. I went with my Si Hing in China, tagging along (which was considered okay) and some guys even laid out a mat and started gambling big two as well. I.e. it's a party with your dead relatives. Some villages you have to do it on the Day of Qing Ming. For Sifu's village it can be done anytime, except that exact day. My father's village, I'm not even sure which village he is from. I heard from a family friend that he is from Dongguan ( a city not the local village or town... or maybe it's a town) so that's what we put on the tombstone when we finally buried his ashes along with my mother's. Ironically, after searching for where the hometown was to put on the tombstone, the engravers ended up spelling the name wrong.. in English. He had a phoeneticized version of a Chinese name. Po Yu Cheung. The name on the stone is Bo Yu Cheung. But I guess that doesn't matter as much so long as the Chinese name (which of course I can't actually read except for the family name which is the same as mine.. My father being my father.) is written correctly. Anyway, last year we decided that we would just start doing our Qing Ming, during Easter. In fact, I guess the two holidays are somewhat related. Jesus' disciples and "others" (that's actually what it said in Luke King James version) went to the grave with spices and other stuff. I don't think Jews go every year, at around the same time, it's just that since Jesus had just died they have to go three days later. I could be wrong about that. And lo and behold, he came back to life, and left. For Qing Ming, you go with a bunch of food and paper money to burn  and it is a yearly occurrence. (I read you are also supposed to go for the winter solstice. I heard the Christians with Norse influence do this two) It's like visiting relatives, except their dead. But you bring food, money and gifts, as if they were alive. See kind of like Jesus and Easter. Anyway, the pagan influence on Easter, rebirth, fertility, eggs, shape shifting witches and hares.... actually I don't know much about that but it seems kind of like it could all mix together alright. So last year we tried it. And failed... more on that next entry. We are ging to try again this year anyway.

Irishness- half a drop of blood still counts

I'm really not that Irish. My European blood is probably mostly Polish. The name Peters (my mother's last name) is German. But the thing is, the Irish relatives/ancestors/family were the loudest and so somehow that became the more predominant culture that was past down. When my mother moved to Boston form Philadelphia her Grandmother said, "Well that's okay at least there are a lot of Irish there." My mom sang "The Wearin of the Green" when I was little because her grandmother had forced her to learn it. And I remember when we were digging through the garage at one of my Great aunts' house there was a chest full of family "treasures." One of these treasures, wrapped up in cloth, and paper, was a piece of earth. I do not even know the name of the Irish Ancestor that brought that over when he came to America or even if he was my great grandfather or what, but there it was, handed down from generation to generation, a piece of earth from Ireland. Noah's speech therapist was actually super Irish, from Ireland, and she was telling me how now they sell clumps of dirt in tourist shops and how ridiculous it seemed that people would actually buy such a thing. To tell the truth, I would not be surprised if the dirt they sell was actually made in China.
So it seems weird to bring the a clump of dirt with you nowadays, what with facebook, and airplanes. But back when you had to get on a boat and probably did not plan on coming back, bringing a piece of earth made total sense and as a child I thought it was really cool.
The Irish name of our family is supposed to be Glackin, or something like that. Though I have never heard of anyone Irish with that last name.
Most of the Irish culture I know about actually comes from..... a summer at band camp. When the camp counselor, who was Jewish, was really into the Clancy Brothers. And I became really into the Clancy Brothers too, to the chagrin of my grandmother, who was more Irish than I was.
I only ever met one other person (okay two) who I was friends with that actually listened to Irish music. One was named Devlin. He was pretty Irish-American. But the songs he sang were not the ones that I knew. I.e. not the ones on the CD's I had.
The other was a Korean adoptee named Kieran. His adopted parents were not Irish. But they gave him an Irish name, and one time during an Asian club party, we started singing all these Irish drinking songs. Really two asians, (even though I look white I'm definately more asian than Irish) singing in brogue.
Well, Happy St. Patrick's day people.

Bedtime stories about Ping On

I'm writing this post for a few reasons. First Lai Chan gave me an old photo. I look almost exactly like Jonah, I am at an protest for Oak street, and there is a sign hung around my neck that says, "My Mommy needs Oak Street for English Classes." My mother, born and raised in Philadelphia, who told people she was of German-Irish descent, because that's what she looked like, and who hid that she was Polish (because that was not cool in her neighborhood growing up) and who by death bed confession from Great grandmother found out she was French (the horror! {sarcasm}) did not need English classes. In fact for a woman of her time she was quite educated. She was a chemist before the periodic table had been filled out.
My father, who was partial owner in a gambling house until "too many people won." did not speak English very well. And I don't think he was going to any classes. By the time the picture I was looking at was taken however, he had already passed away. But when people saw my white face with a hint of slant at the eyes, the sign around my neck was what made sense.
So that's the first thing.
The second thing is there was an article in the news yesterday. It was about a white guy who was part of a Chinatown gang. The person writing the article said that this was a difficult thing to accomplish because Chinatown, which is in Boston, which is in America, was a closed society unto itself and that it would be difficult for a white person (like my mother?) to be a part of it.
Finally, the article also had the words Ping On and the word notorious next to each other.
When I first heard these two words together on the street, I cringed inwardly. Because after my father died among the many bedtime stories about the Hobbit, or Robin Hood, their were sprinkled family history, about her, my dad, and also about her travels and my other relatives in Philadelphia. My dad was part of Ping On, before it got "taken down" by the FBI. In fact my mother worked in one of the clubs that was opened by it's members and she spoke a little Chinese. Enough that one time a schmuck of an FBI agent started talking to her and tried to get her to be an informant. He was saying this inside the club, and gave her his card. He only saw a white woman working in this club. He probably didn't realize she was with my dad. She took his card and told one of the brothers (not the blood kind, the other kind) what had happened. He replied by saying, "Oh yeah give him my card I'll tell him if I see any criminal activity." This particular brother was a felon. An example my mom gave was one time she was helping him and this other woman set up a house. Move furniture around etc. She noticed the woman, a Korean American from Providence who my mom didn't really know seemed to keep touching and adjusting herself and didn't really seem to care that there were other people in the room. My mom thought that was odd. Later she realized that the woman was a prostitute and that she had just set up a temporary brothel.
Was my mom part of this world? Not really. At least she didn't feel so. She complained that they never let her into the gambling halls. No women allowed. But she knew of another woman that was allowed in there to gamble. When she said this to my dad he would say something along the lines of "that's different." My mom felt left out. Not that she wanted to gamble. Just that she wanted to be part of the club. For the same reason she was mad that as a girl her Uncle would take her brother to the boxing fights in Philadelphia, but she never got to go.
Did my dad get in trouble with the police? My mom says that about once a week, walking home she would see Baba in the back of a patty wagon because the police had raided the gambling house (usually without warrants or for whatever reason it always came to nothing) It just meant that he would be late getting home.
"If you're son ever has to see you in the back of a wagon like this!.. " well so that "job" stopped. Sort of.
She would tell me about how the Ping On kids used to do lion dance on new years but just banged on the drum and didn't even have a head and had shirts with the words "Ping On" on it in big English letters and that my Dad made them take the shirts off before the Police saw and scolded them about it. She told me about how those kids used to regularly borrow her van, having gotten permission from my Dad. But then when they came to her she would yell at them because whatever they went and did with that van, they never filled the gas tank back up. So they would run back and fort between my dad at the gambling house and my mom at the apartment asking one and then the other.
But most of all she would tell me about the time the electricity went off in Chinatown for two weeks. The police wouldn't come to Chinatown. So "Ping On" had people stand outside the businesses to make sure there was no looting. She would then say she saved the articles that demonized the gang, and while she was sure there were terrible crimes committed, people killed, that that wasn't the whole story. The way my mom told it,my dad and others like him were like the Knights of the Round table. Propaganda to boost my youthful opinion of my late father to be sure. But still, I thought I would share it.
"With working at the restaurant and the money coming in form the gambling your dad almost made as much as a white guy." She said.
And then when the gang was "taken down" my mom said she saw the same people on the street, doing the same things, just using a different name. So that FBI take down was all for show to boost a few egos of some young agents but they didn't actually accomplish anything.
Is Chinatown better now? yes. But not because of one big take down. Chinatown is better now because more white people, more white women, and more asians with money live in it. At first my mother viewed gentrification and the building of University Campuses right in Chinatown with suspicion too. But the results were, students walking around which made for safer and friendlier streets. But more about that later.

Recover Fu

So after my fasting day (not by choice but a gift from whatever food poisoning I received from the Olive Garden) I was not immediately able to jump up and do hard external Kung Fu for my workouts. In fact for a little while I got tired from walking and chasing the kids around. So I focused more on internal, meditation, that sort of thing. And I've been liking it. I think I will stick to my easy does it practice, with some finger pushups and some pullups thrown in there. One at a time, just as a little spice instead of as the staple grain or main course.
I've been thinking too, about what I want. Having watched Kung Fu Panda, sick, I was thinking my fantasy would be to have a school like that, in a valley like that. But then I thought about it more and realized that is a lot of stairs to climb or to descend just to go somewhere. I guess it's okay if you can fly up or down like a cartoon character. So maybe vene if I could have that Palace, I don't necessarily want it.
I think I'm just going to start referring to the Sugar Bowl which is currently green and muddy, as the Jade Palace. And that little pond across from it, not Jamaica Pond but the tiny secluded one where there is  alittle stream and almost a sort of beach. That's going to be the sacred pool of tears.
If I call them these things I guess in a way they become them, and so just like that i have the Jade Palace as a Kung Fu school. It's next to my house, and it requires no stairs.
Ahhh.. that was easy.
As for practicing, running around in the rain or snow in the middle of the night or day, I'll have to wait for the kids to both be in school, or old enough to join me to do that.
Being sick and dehydrated made me realize another thing. That I don't drink enough water when I practice super hard. And that's probably one of the reasons I get so sore. I found this out, because doing nothing but vomiting all day...I got pretty sore.
So when I finally have the time or freedom to travel to the Jade Palace or Pool of Sacred Tears again, either alone, or with children that are well dressed for the weather and who can walk by themselves, while obeying Baba, when it comes to watching out for traffic etc. I'm going to be bringing a big water jug with me. Maybe two. That way I can use them like weights to punch with. And then I can also drink out of them.
For now though, I just do Horse stance next to my sleeping son if I can't sleep, and then some Mein Lay jum in the morning when I wake up. Its simple and not too much. Enough for now.