Tag Archives: holiday

Work Off On Holy Week

Background: The informant is a 59 year old woman. She was born in Pampanga, Philippines and moved to Los Angeles when she was 29 yearsold. The informant still frequently speaks to her family and occasionally visits her family in the Philippines. The informant grew up as Catholic in the Philippines, converting to evangelical Christianity during her time in Los Angeles. She was exposed to the tradition when living in the Philippines. 

Context: The context was during Easter, the informant brought up how he was raised. He seemed surprised at how it was different in America.

Text:

EM: For the Holy Week, you know Holy Week? It’s when Jesus, you know, suffered and died. We celebrate it for a week. Let’s say, you know, let’s say, for the whole week, there’s no work for the whole week. No class, no school, no work for the whole week.

Me: In the Philippines?

EM: In the Philippines. Not here. You know, all people work still, right? That’s what I remember: we don’t work. When I was there, still there, we don’t work the whole week, especially student, it was kind of like that.

Analysis:

Informant: She grew up with no work being normalized during Holy Week. When she came to America, it was extremely different from what she had previously experienced, and it took some adjusting to see everyone still working during the Holy Week.

Mine: It’s interesting to see how the same traditions are represented differently depending on the geographic location, revealing that, though the world is becoming more globalized due to the rise of the internet, there still remains a large amount of folklore tied to the physical location. In the Philippines, not working was considered the baseline expectation during the Holy week; in America, I have never heard of someone taking the Holy Week off work or other activities. Even Easter is not even afforded a three day weekend in most circumstances. The change in tradition is likely due to a different breakdown of religions in the two countries. In the Philippines, where the population is more homogenous, mostly everyone is going to be following the same faith. However, in America, pushing to have the Holy Week off work would reveal a government preference towards religion, leaving the choice to the individual. However, it could be seen as uncomfortable if nobody else is taking the time off work. Therefore, folklore can still be affected by social context, and extremely by who the group is made up with (is the group homogeneous or heterogeneous?) and where the physical location is.

Unwrapping Tamales For Christmas

Background: The informant is a 52 year old man. He was born in Tulare, California. He grew up with his four siblings and two parents, moving from location to location across California. He currently lives in Los Angeles, California. 

Context: The context as that when the informant was eating tamales, he was reminded of Christmas.

Text:

MD: “Well typically, uh, mexican families, they make, uh, tamales for Christmas, and, you know, it’s kind of like a seasonal food, and that’s considered traditional to make tamales for Christmas, and uh, the big joke about tamales and mexicans is that the reason why mexicans make tamales is so they can have something to unwrap for christmas. And so uh, I used to help my mom make ‘em, and we would kind of like interchange, like, you know, sometimes I would like, layout the leaves and spread the masa, which is like corn dough, on them, or other times she would do that, and she would allow me to put the meat inside of it. It’s like a meat sauce, and uh, she didn’t like me putting the meat with the sauce in the tamale because I would typically put too much and, uh, she’d kind of strive for balance between the masa and the meat, the problem though too is like when you steam them, if you, if you put too much meat inside them, they kind of overflow, and they, they break apart the tamale, you know? It is what it is.” 

Analysis:

Informant: He is very humorous and recalls both the joke and the tamales in good fun. He reminisces about his time with his mother and looks to it as a great bonding moment between the two of them each year.

Mine: First, the joke’s context is that Mexicans are considered poor in America and will not have the money to buy presents for their family. While on the surface, the joke seems like a laughable jab, it speaks to a much deeper social context, about how Mexican families are treated in the greater societal context of the US. Typically, they do not have higher paying jobs or may be supporting a larger family and much more. However, the joke is prevalent in Mexican communities in order to make light of their hardships. It shows how humor is consistently used to make a situation seem better and it’s a source of hope. Second, making tamales on Christmas is very widespread in Mexican culture. Given how the informant would always complete the task with his mother, it provided a way for the two of them to connect through their culture of making food. 

Easter Capirotada

Background: The informant is a 50 year old man. He was born in Tecate, Mexico, moving to California when he was young. He grew up with his four siblings and two parents, moving from location to location across California. He currently lives in Los Angeles, California. 

Context: The context was a few weeks before Easter, and the informant began sharing stories about what happens before Easter when walking in the mall past Easter decorations.


Text:

UI: “Around Easter, when I was a kid, we used to go to my grandmothers, in uh, Delano, which is a small town near Bakersfield, and, and what she used to do is that she would make this, hm, I don’t know how to explain it. It’s like a bread pudding and in Spanish it’s called capirotada. You know, I haven’t had it in so long because it takes like all day to make it. What you do is start off with about a week old bread, and then you put it in a tray with butter. And basically, it’s like traditional Mexican bread. It’s like a bread pudding type bread, and you typically make it before Easter and it’s like day old bread with raisins and butter and nuts, and it’s just like it all melts together with cinnamon and they sprinkle it with cheese on top and it all kind of like blends together into a weird pudding mixture, and that’s basically in preparation for Easter. I used to help my grandmother make it, because she would make trays and trays for everybody. The bread represents the body of Christ, the syrup is his blood, and the cloves are the nails of the cross, and the whole cinnamon sticks are the woods of the cross, and the melted cheese stands for the holy shroud. I guess it’s just like hidden meanings with the crucifixion of Jesus for Easter within the food.” 

Analysis:

Informant: He was very excited when sharing the story and appeared actually nostalgic for his childhood. Evidently, the time making food with his grandmother was a peaceful time of his life, and he loved the food.

Mine: Many of the foods around the holiday have hidden religious meanings behind them, having a dual cultural significance for both being a food to bring together family on holidays and for the religious context. The informant made the food with his grandmother, serving as time for the two of them to bond and for him to be taught the recipe of the Mexican dish. He was in the transition state from passively accepting the tradition when he began cooking with his grandmother. Then, the capirotada holds religious folklore, with each element not being randomly chosen, but rather chosen to represent an element of Christ. Given that the informantant still remembers the information after all these years, it is clear that the message imparted onto him by his grandmother held a deep value for him. It is our elders who are carrying on the traditions and they must be listened to in order to fully absorb it.

Czech Christmas Tradition

Background Information: 

The informant was born and raised in Australia, but has roots in the Czechia. She is describing her childhood in Sydney.

Main Content: 

ME: Hey can you tell me about your experiences during Christmas. 

SP: So on Christmas Eve instead of Santa Clause coming St. Nicholas comes and if you are a really good child you get an orange or an apple from him, and if you are a really bad child the equivalent of Satan comes and basically kidnaps you forever, and if your orange or apple is really sweet that is like the best present you could’ve gotten from Saint Nick and it means that you are gonna have a really good year. 

ME: Does the apple or orange specifically have any significance?

SP: Umm, Oh! Its actually an apple, orange, or golden pig. The golden pig is actually the one that has the most significance and basically when I was little, ummm,  on Christmas eve my grandma would sprinkle golden fairy dust to make the trail of a golden pig, and then that would lead to our stockings which would have either an apple or an orange in them, and that was basically our parents way of telling us that we were good children that year. 

ME: Who started introduced this tradition to you?

SP: So basically my mom’s family is Czech, so my grandparents on my mom’s side and I just got brought up with it. 

Context:

This conversation happened in-person. 

Thoughts: 

I think it is really interesting to see different Christmas traditions from different backgrounds. It’s interesting that the children receive gifts on Christmas Eve, instead of Christmas morning. This tradition is very different from the modern American gift-giving. Considering that on Christmas Eve, the two outcomes for a child in this tradition is either receiving a fruit or being kidnapped by the devil, it is very different from the conventional American tradition of receiving exuberant gifts if you were good, or getting a piece of coal if you were bad. 

Midwest Traditions Before Halloween

Background Information: 

The informant was born and raised in Michigan. They are a good friend of mine and we grew up together. 

Main Content: 

ME: So you mind telling me a little bit about the Boo tradition that we grew up with?

DS: So back in middle school and elementary school, not as much in high school, the night before Halloween, we would go around to our friend’s houses, a group of kids, and we would leave a bag of candy on the porch, knock on their door, and run away. That was just the tradition that you would always do with your friends the night before Halloween. We took it really seriously, maybe more seriously than we should have. We would always try to catch the person who was ‘Booing’ us, and we would always try to escape unseen when we were the ones doing the ‘Booing’. We would leave a cute note, hinting at your identity, but sometimes you just didn’t know who ‘Booed’ you. If you couldn’t catch them, you would always try to figure it out the next day at school. 

ME: Haha, were the parents in on it? Or was it looked down upon? 

DS: So the parents were always in on it. Especially because we were so young. So, the parents of the people doing the ‘Booing’ were usually the ones most involved. They would drive the kids there and they would help prepare the bags. They took it almost as seriously as the kids did. I remember once I heard a knock on my door, I walked outside and I see this car fishtailing out of my driveway, and there was a bag of candy left on my doorstep. ‘

Context: 

This interview happened at my house. 

Thoughts: 

This is something that I loved doing growing up. Me and the informant, along with some of our other friends, used to go around “Booing” people. We would stay up all night hiding in the bushes in front of our homes to catch people who were trying to “Boo” us. After doing some research I found that this tradition was started in the US around the 80s and has been observed in certain pockets of the US, for instance, another friend from Ohio told me that they also did this tradition (https://www.wxyz.com/about-us/as-seen-on/you-can-be-the-first-person-to-start-the-art-of-booing-in-your-neighborhood-classroom-or-community) . However there are some slight variations, apparently some people begin “Booing” in November, and you are supposed to put a ghost on your window to signify that you have been “Booed”. As kids, it was the one time of the year where we could act mischievously and stay out late, with our parent’s full support. I think a large reason for this is because the night before Halloween is also referred to as Devil’s Night and in Detroit it is a famous night of mischief. I reckon our parents let us get away with minor mischief to keep us away from the real mischief on that night.