Cardinal O'Malley's Chinese New Year Sermon

Today was St. James' Chinese New Year celebration. It was not as crowded at last year. Not even by half. When Grace heard that it was Cardinal O'Malley who had spoken she said, "Not the famous guy. Him? He's a big deal. There should have been more people this year." But snow vs. famous speaker only if you know Catholic Politics or I guess you could say God vs. Church. Well nature and God win.

He mentioned in his sermon that one of the ways to get people to be Catholic would be to behave in a way that would make people say, "If that's what being Catholic is about then I want to be Catholic too."

Well, I was there at St. James for that reason. Because the people I knew from that church behaved in a way that I wanted to emulate and I wanted my children to emulate. But that also meant that when I heard he was coming to speak, the name rang a bell but I didn't much care. But I am glad I decided to listen to his sermon because I did enjoy it.

Mostly he started listing comparisons between Chinese New Year and Catholic traditions and focusing on the Zodiac and animal symbolism in Catholicism. I'm not sure if most people cared for or understood this subject, but as it happens, I as a Half Chinese kid that went to Nativity Prep, did this sort of thing in my head during class, all the time. So thanks.

I even learned something. The Cain and Abel story was brought up because a ram was sacrificed by Abel and Cain gave fruit as a sacrifice. (Interestingly spilling blood on Chinese New Year is a no no, but all the Ram/Lamb reference were pretty gruesome and indeed since a lot of Christianity is about Jesus' sacrifice, like blood spilling as an offering, well Christianity is pretty bloody and gruesome too.

 He could have went with just talking about the color red over your door, and how that was done in Exodus with blood but Chinese just use red paper, but blood is too important in Catholicism.

Anyway, I learned that one interpretation of the Cain and Abel story was that some people wanted to "have faith in God to provide for them" and be nomads. as opposed to farmers. That was Abel. And then others like Cain, wanted to be like the Pagans and build cities and farm. By this interpretation, the most Godly were the nomadic Native Americans of the plains like the Lakota Sioux who worshiped the Great Spirit and followed the Buffalo. And the missionaries who Christianized them were making them more like Cain and less like Abel. In the story God accepted Abel's sacrifice and rejected Cain's. Cain then goes ahead and murders Abel, who is is brother. Hmmm that happen with us and the Native Americans too. Anwyay, I had never heard that interpretation of the story, and I also thought it was an interesting interpretation coming from a Catholic priest or any group that built things (like churches) and lived in cities.

Mot of the rest of the sermon focused on Lent and he told the joke about the priest and the mugger who gave up chocolate for lent but was in the process of mugging the priest.
Not sure if his sermon was really appropriate for the mostly Chinese audience.
But I liked the little tidbits of scriptural knowledge, even if it turns out to be Catholic exegesis. But that's because I'm a story interpretation geek.

Happy Chinese New Year Cardinal O'Malley!

Watching Peggy Sue Got Married

This movie by Francis Ford Coppola was on after we got back from Grace's Lion dancing, the feast that followed and other errands where the kids fell asleep n the car. and it entranced me as the kids just zoned out on a device. It was so strange. A similar plot is made into a movie about every 5 years by Disney, but Coppola's version had you on edge the whole time like you are watching a horror movie, and yet, the horror never comes. In fact the scary part is the whole idea that you can live your life differently and make drastic changes to your destiny, and yet, unlike the Back to the Future series there is no dystopian future. It's almost like an adult Wizard of OZ too. I couldn't stop watching it. And ultimately, it helps you to realize how important your children are. That you wouldn't change your children for other children. At least I wouldn't. Not for being president of the United States or Emperor of the Galaxy. Grace mentioned that he did this movie after the godfather so people were kind of like, "What the hell?" and Coppola was like, "I just wanted to make a cute movie okay." But all the cinematography is real Hitchcock like. Well maybe not, but it was all creepy even though all the scenes were heart warming and there is no monster jumping out.
There doesn't seem to be much discussion about it on Wikipedia. It's treated like any other 80's movie, but I had never heard of it. Another weird thing is Jim Carey is in it. Anyway, it's worth checking out. Better than the Godfather III for sure. Not exactly the Godfather but imagine a cute 80's movie but with strangely philosophical and disturbing themes lurking in the background of an otherwise quaint little "return to high school" type plot. For real check it out.

Hey your Lion Dance didn't work! We have Ice Dams!

I saw pictures of friends posting their accomplishments cleaning their roofs of and breaking their ice dams and I am beginning to feel pretty useless in this respect. I mean normal Dads are taking care of their houses why can't Kung Fu Dad? The answer is either those dads are abnormally useful or that Kung Fu Dad is abnormally useless. I won't say I am useless, but the truth is a mixture of both. I am afraid to go on the roof, I lack the ladder and I don't know how. I know my friends just did it. But I am beginning to see why people who can just do it don't take to Kung Fu. Because if they got into a fight that would just win... without training. They would just get it done. It is the cautious afraid type that is more drawn to training and dedicating one's life to various exercises with no pay off, in fact often paying.

Our downstairs neighbor upon luckily finding a guy to do the roof, who is probably around my age and very courageous looking and simply goes up, ties himself to the chimney and gets it done said to me, "Hey it's Chinese New Year, aren't you supposed to be blessing our house? It didn't work! We have ice dams now!"
Not only that but the heater is also leaking so a plumber must be called.

I suppose if I was earning a living I wouldn't mind as much, but actually Grace is the one who earns the living so what is it exactly that I am doing?

I am beginning to see that it was time I learned a trade. I could have should have would have done it earlier. And to tell the truth I can't even start NOW. Before I go off doing something full time or even part time, Jonah needs to be in school. But when he is, I have to learn something, and get into being the stereotypical American Dad who hangs out at the hardware store and can DO things. Maybe I should ask these roof guys if they will accept apprentices or interns, or whatever I would be called to start over at the beginning of usefulness on my journey to mastering a craft other than punching and kicking the air.

Chinese American New Year

Success! In a crazy and interesting way. I was getting ready to head out when the door bell rang . Yay!! People actually came. It was Noah's friend L and his  Mom R and also the younger sibling N was in Jonah's playgroup. The mother in the family is Japanese and she told me some of the traditions for New Year's there. R said that actually they even celebrated Chinese and Japanese New Year depending on which sect of Buddhism you followed, and they also gave out lucky money and had lion dance. This was pretty cool to hear about since a lot of the people from Japan I met through college and high school hadn't been exposed to this side of the culture. But I suppose the same is true of people I met through school who were from Hong Kong or Shanghai.
Anyway, I don't know how we would have done the parade without her help. She ended up taking the Lead Role of the person who leads the Lion head because otherwise how could I play drum while I carried Jonah and how would Noah know where to go?
We did a full on lion dance for our house and the neighbors who were pretty impressed with Noah's "Dramatic pausing" which comes from the big bow. It is one of the reasons why I taught him the big bow instead of the small bow. In a way the small bow is more economical and makes more sense. But as a beginner, bowing is about the only thing you know how to do, so it might as well be a long ritualized event in and of itself. However, but the third house, we were down to the small bow.

We navigated snow banks higher than me let alone Noah (who is 5) and at one point the Lion head and L got in the sled that R brought along and I carried Jonah. I continued to play my toy drum and honestly I was actually getting tired. Maybe this wasn't 5 hours long, but it was still hard. Maybe we stayed within a couple of blocks of our house. But this really felt like an adventure!

The third house was was in Noah's classmate K and the younger sibling B was in Jonah's playgroup. Jonah snuck into her house and just started playing with toys. I almost left him there. The tail was tucked into Noah's sash. And at some point, Jonah wore the head while on my shoulders and I played the drum. Going against tradition, there were times when I just had to stop playing the drum because what could I do.

We went into the house and I made Noah back out just like he would have to on Chinese New Year and here is the best part of this whole adventure for us. The drums weren't as loud and there were no firecrackers, but in a lot of ways, for the people doing it, it was just like the Parade in Chinatown where we were going up and down flights of stairs. In other words, Noah is being trained for that event now, in a smaller scale event than that he can actually handle.

The last house, was another of Noah's classmates M who also happened to be in my Lion Dance and Kung Fu class. He played cymbals and followed the beat pretty well. I think the dance seemed short to them but Noah was wiped out, as was I to tell the truth.  R passed out Chinese New Year Popcorn to each family! This is such an ingenius idea. It was homemade popcorn in a paper bag with the words New Year written in Kanji (which is basically Chinese) on red construction paper. The kids loved it and of course avoided the Chinese New Year candy at all cost. Chinese New Year popcorn may have to become a thing at our house even though R had just made it up. If you think about it, the idea of a Chinese New Year goodie bag with something like homemade popcorn is so American and so JP and at the same time more cultural than the candy that kids don't like and are manufactured elsewhere. I'm telling you, Chinese New Year popcorn could catch on as a thing, like Halloween candy. (after all it was bread and water that was left out for Samain)
Chinese New Year really has potential as a mainstream American holiday. The only house we visited today that was remotely Chinese was our own. But everyone thought it was cool that we stopped by, Why not?
I definitely couldn't have done this without R's help though. So before I get a real drum, what I really need is a real team. Of course I am part of a real team in Chinatown. But for a real team for this house to house thing I need a real local team.

A lot of people seem to privately own real heads and drums and equipment. If you do you should totally go door to door in the neighborhood you live in too. In Boston Chinatown businesses often complain about too many teams. The truth is that you can grow the audience by bringing this holiday to non-Chinese households. Of course you won't get any cash up front in red envelopes. But if you already have the equipment who cares? You will form bonds and connections while celebrating this holiday. Maybe you can pass out New Year's popcorn.
I'm pretty excited for the potential for next year.

Anyway, Noah went with R and L to go sledding while I dropped off equipment with Jonah and picked up our sled. The kids tore into the Chinese New Year Popcorn and we had a fun time sledding. After ward, R and L came over to our house since it was on the way to theirs and it was snowing pretty heavily. The kids played and ate lunch and drank hot chocolate. At some point crankiness started to set in. But it reminded me a lot of what we will do in Chinatown on March 1st, except on a smaller scale. On the Facebook Group, Chinese Lion Dancers, there are videos Lion Dance in Hawaii the weekend before Chinese New Year. Maybe I will do that next year and hopefully recruit more people to help. At least Grace right? We could even do the big head. And we really should get a real drum. Anyway, I have a whole year to think about it.

New Year's morning.

I ended up staying up all night lat night. Not because it is the tradition but because the kids fell asleep and when Grace got home we watched suits and then hung out. But it happens to be the tradition too. This morning Jonah ran down stairs crying. "Gung Hei Faht Choi!" I said handing him a red envelope.
"Gung hei Faht Choi!" he screamed back crying like it was a swear or something and ran from the red envelope like it would hurt him. Great.

He eventually came around though two seconds later.

Noah knew what this was about sort of, but asked why the 100 dollar bill was so small.
"Umm because it is real." He is used to the play money. Noah somehow felt that something was wrong. Why was he getting real money? It almost made him nervous.

Actually when he first woke up and I said "Gung hei faht choi" his response was, "Why are you saying things?"

Because it's Chinese New Year.

"But it doesn't feel like Chinese New Year."

I suppose you are right Noah.

I tried to give them Chinese New Year candy but the container was pretty difficult to open. We'll try again for lunch, and then I'll give out some New Year's present because Noah' right, currency has no real meaning to them. In fact the big money that is fake is of more use to them.

Well I guess I have to use the internet to put something Chinese New Year like on. But then, the kids are happy watching sprout right now. I have to go shovel and then prepare for my little homemade parade.

Sun tai geen hong!!! Sun tai geen Hong!!!!!

New Year's Eve

Well maybe we should have done our Tuen leen fahn on the weekend after all. Due to the state of the T Grace has been coming home rather late. I encourage her to just stay out and make the best of the situation. Enjoy yourself, etc.
Tomorrow me and the boys will go and do our lion dance for a few houses. Our house, a neighbor, and a friend. I'm going to use the cardboard head that I painted instead of the more "authentic" looking one because I don't want that one to get wet from the snow. The drum is going to be one of the toy drums and toy cymbals and gongs (though I may not have anyone to actually play those.

But it's mainly the idea. Basically it's all I got in terms of some sort of ritual or celebration. So I might as well do it.

I'm actually more nervous about this little adventure than the actual parade in Chinatown. I mean, I don't know if I will actually succeed, or if someone will call the police on me. That's another reason why even though it is kind of lame that I have a toy drum, it is also sort of safer.

But one day I hope to do this thing on my block with the real heads and a real drum. It can be a small drum, but you know, bam, a real drum. I actually have a real head so that isn't really the issue is it? But a real head and a fake drum.. that just won't match, so might as well have a fake head too.

Wong Fei Hung Marathon

I thought Noah and I might watch all the Once Upon a time in China movies this week. But it turns out Noah just wants to watch the lion dance fights. I used to wish that these movies were more realistic. But now I realize that Wong Fei Hung happened to exist, but the movies have made him into a Paul Bunyan Cultural hero where you can use the events to preach certain ideas. Mainly the movies from the 90's with Jet Li are Hong Kong ideals that Chinese People should be modern, support foreign investment, continue to hold on to their traditions but not superstitions, make the country strong, and be Christian. This last one is easier to see when you look at actual history versus the movies.

Most of the frothing at the mouth bad guys in the movies are Buddhist. But the biggest frothing at the mouth rebellion at real Wong Fei Hung's time was the Tai Ping. Supposedly he was a medic for the black flag militia which fought some battles for them too.

But in the movies, Wong Fei Hung is like an invincible god who preaches and hits people with crosses or cross like objects.

The world he is in is so far away from the modern world that it' more like a fairy land or Camelot even though it's not actually that ong ago. That's because there was so much change from his time to 1990's Hong Kong.

Now it seems like 1990's Hong Kong is a world away from today's Hong Kong and China. But this fantasy world Wong Fei Hung is in that never happened willed with lion heads... well that's not that different from Noah's house.