Tag Archives: soldiers

A Haunted Park called Giggle Hill

Interviewer: What is being performed?

 

Informant: Haunted park called Giggle Hill by Rayna Koishikawa

 

Interviewer: What is the background information about the performance? Why do you know or like this piece? Where or who did you learn it from?

 

Informant: Giggle Hill is a park in Maui. The legend says you are supposed to hear giggling but my friends and I only heard screaming (turned out to be owls)

 

Interviewer: What country and what region of that country are you from?

 

Informant: US Maui, HI

 

Interviewer: Do you belong to a specific religious or social sub group that tells this story?

 

Informant: No

 

Interviewer: Where did you first hear the story?

 

Informant: My experience, the legend says the soldiers brought their girlfriends up on the hill and you can still hear them giggling. We only heard screaming.

 

Interviewer: What do you think the origins of this story might be?

 

Informant: It depends on which story.

 

Interviewer: What does it mean to you?

 

Informant: It’s just a fun story from my past.

 

Context of the performance– classmate conversing before class

 

Thoughts about the piece

An old WWII story still encourages young people to visit a romantic spot in groups but sometimes have a different experience from the original. Giggle Hill is a well-known landmark and park that is featured here: http://mauimama.com/parks/united-states/hawaii/haiku-pauwela/parks/4th-marine-division-memorial-park-giggle-hill/  and http://www.hawaiimagazine.com/content/tour-hawaiis-creepiest-places-google-street-view-so-you-dont-really-have

Shabbat Khayal

The informant is an Israeli American who grew up practicing traditions from both her Israeli and Persian culture. She describes a custom surrounding the sending off and return of teenagers who are drafted as soldiers. The informant recalls one of these parties that she attended when she was young.

  • Shabbat Khayal is an Israeli tradition having to do with young soldiers. There is a kind of sending off that people do, when they first are um drafted. And so people have you know: goodbye parties, they’ll have um celebrations and then everybody holds their breath until soldiers get through their training which is like an intensive three months that they don’t really see family and its you know really crazy and they don’t really see their families and then there is a homecoming and thats a really big deal. The moms will buy all their favorite food and snacks and cook all their favorite meals and get their rooms ready and its like a whole you know and theres an excitement and build up when the family comes over and everybody wants to hear stories and see how that teenager has changed… so um theres that kind of anticipation and you know people know who’s son is coming home and this home’s daughter is coming home and there is a lot of support in the community around it. And once they’re placed within the army, and they kind of know what they are going to be doing for the next two or three years, then they get weekends off here and there, and those weekends are a really big deal. You know, same thing happens- you know family gets together, everybody comes for shabbat, the soldiers are like center of attention. Again everything with the food, they do their laundry, they make sure that they’re resting, that they’re seeing their friends, its like a whole big thing when a soldier is home. And i think thats in the fabric of pretty much every Israeli family.
  • Sometimes people will take them to see a rabbi or someone for a blessing before they send them back out- depending on their background and culture you know if they’re Persian, Ashkenazi Jews, but some people will take them to someone and ask them to kind of say you know thank God, you made it through this far and then before we turn around and send him back you know give a blessing to make sure that he/she is safe and that God watches over them and that they come back to the family. So a lot of people will set something up like that or take them to Jerusalem or something kind of sentimental like that. 
  • I was apart of one of these rituals when I was a little younger for my cousin- it was such a build up, I mean you don’t really hear from them or have contact with them. I mean I can’t even think about what to compare it to here in America, I mean there is not really much- you’re sending a teenager away, and its a high schooler and they’ve just graduated and all of a sudden they are thrown into this entirely different setting, so I just remember my aunt getting everything ready and going to every different market and getting all his favorites and getting them all together and making sure it was all there. And then him coming home and looking so grown up and different and everybody wanting to hear all his stories and how is was, and what does he think he wants to do in the army, and how did he test, and he becomes that kind of center of attention and it will last all weekend, and people will spend the night, and want to be with them and yeah its very special. 

ANALYSIS:

I think that a traditions such at Shabbat Khayal are really important for families who have loved ones at war or in training. I think the whole celebration an already special occasion that much more intimate and important for both the family and the teenager. Most importantly, I believe that people continue to have these celebrations not only because it is tradition, but because it gives the family and the teenager something to think about and look forward too, instead of the family anxiously waiting around for the teenager to return they have the opportunity to run around preparing and gathering friends and family, focusing on what is most important in life.

 

 

San Emeterius and Celedonius

“This is the legend of the patron saints of Calahorra, Spain, my home town and also of the city of Santander, a coastal city on the Bay of Bisay. The Roman poet Aurelius Prudentius, that was also from Calahorra, said that two brothers, Emeterius and Celedonius, who served as soldiers of the seventh legion called, Gemina were martyred at Calagurris (now known as Calahorra). But the exact time and place are unknown. The legend says they were martyred around the year 300 AD at the banks of the Cidacos River, which still today bears the same name and flows by the town. This was during the prosecutions of Christians by Emperor Diocletian and Emperor Valerian. They were imprisoned and forced to decide between renouncing their Christian faith or leaving the army. The legend says, they chose their faith and as a result were tortured and finally decapitated on banks of the river outside the city walls. When the soldiers were decapitated, they were kneeling on the bank and their severed heads rolled down into the water. Their heads floated away in the river and made their way onto a raft made of stone that was miraculously floating. But instead of floating downstream, south towards the Mediteranean where the river eventually discharges, they floated upstream. Eventually finding their way to the city of Santander where the heads also received veneration. In Santander, Alfonso, the 2nd of Aragon, built an abbey in honor of these two saints. In Calahorra, on the spot where they were martyred, the Christian cathedral was built, in the 4th century, in the late 300’s. The cathedral that exists in the town today was built on top of this original cathedral. It has been a puzzle as to why the cathedral was built outside the city walls and on the river bank and the legend explains this because this was the exact location of their decapitation. The coat of arms of the city of Calahorra features the names of the saints, two crossing swords and two half moons that represent the beheaded necks with dripping blood. August 30th is the major city holiday of the year, celebrating the patron saints. Relics of the two saints are taken out from the cathedral on procession through the town streets on this day. Even the main street in Calahorra is called “Calle de los Martires” (Street of the Martyrs) and martyrdom is a common theme in all the cities memorabilia, seals, and collective culture. There are elementary schools, businesses, bakeries, pastry shops, that use the saints names and/or “martyr.” The “fiestas patronales” (town festivals) are in their honor. The city is often referred to, even today as “The City of the Martyrs” just as New York City is called “The Big Apple.”

 

 

This legend, it’s continuation and it being the basis for present-day businesses and festivals is exemplary of how the influence the Catholic church had on the country of Spain and continues to have. Although, many people no longer affiliate with the religion of Catholicism, most of Spain’s traditions are rooted in it and continue to be performed. Every town in Spain has its own patron saint(s) and the festivals of the town are based on those saints. One of the most well known examples of this is the festival of Sanfermines from the city of San Fermin. Their patron saint is Saint Fermin.

My father, the participant is from the town of Calahorra, Spain and I, myself have been there many times. I have partaken in the festivals (‘fiestas’) and been to the cathedral but never knew the story behind the patron saints of the town.