Monthly Archives: April 2017

Origins of the Mid-Autumn Festival

Nationality: American, Chinese
Age: 24
Occupation: Flight Analyst
Residence: New York, NY
Performance Date: April 26, 2017
Primary Language: English
Language: Chinese

The 24-year-old informant is originally from Rhode Island, but currently resides in New York, NY. Her parents are both from China, making her a first-generation American Born Chinese. This story was one that she heard as a child and has been engrained in her mind ever since.

“A long, long time ago, there was a man—a great archer—and his wife, a beautiful maiden. One day, 10 suns rose in the sky, which threatened to scorch the entire earth. So, in retaliation, the archer shot 9 of the 10 suns down. Because of this, he became a celebrity in his village and in nearby villages as well. For this deed, he was rewarded a special elixir of immortality by the goddess of the sun. One day, when the archer’s wife was home alone, thieves broke into the house to steal the elixir of immortality. Because the wife did not want the thieves to steal it—she drank it all herself before any of the thieves could get to it. As a result, she immediately floated up to the heavens and situated herself on the moon because it’s the closest place to earth—‘cause she wanted to be as close to her husband as possible, and she became the new goddess of the Moon. The archer was so sad that he left food for her as a sacrifice, and thus created the traditions of the Mid-Autumn Festival.”

This story is a very notable myth regarding the origins of the Mid-Autumn Festival. It is the most commonly told origin story for this holiday. Other versions of the story say that the archer becomes the Sun because he is able to shoot down 9 of the 10 suns, and thus describe the origins of both the Sun and the Moon.

The Three Brothers (Bauhinia)

Nationality: Chinese
Age: 54
Occupation: Chinese Teacher
Residence: Rhode Island
Performance Date: April 26, 2017
Primary Language: Chinese
Language: English

The 54-year-old informant is a elementary school Chinese teacher and is originally from Taiyuan, China. She’s been hearing and telling Chinese folklore her entire life, and often shares it with her students. Her stories represent Chinese culture and the qualities that Chinese people value.

“Once, there were three brothers… they treat each other very well because in Chinese tradition, brotherly love in a family is very important because after parents pass away, brothers treat each other very well. If their relationship’s not great, that means the whole family will be broken. Even if they have the same last name, sometimes they will be like enemies.

Sooo, in this family there are three brothers, the first two are already married, and the third one married later, but the third brother’s wife is the kind of girl that brought in a lot of good stuff in terms of family needs. Like, silver and gold– she grew up in a rich family I guess… And this kind of situation, she tried to create trouble. She said, ‘Ok, why don’t we separate from the other two brothers, so this way, we can live better, right?’ Because they live together and they eat together and they work in the field together. So, this is why the wife of the third brother feels like it’s not fair and that they can live better without the two brothers. So, that’s why the property has to be divided into three.

So everything is divided really well and equally, but there’s only one tree in the yard… do not know how to do it. So they talk about how to divide the tree, probably just chop into three pieces and even the leaves would be divided equally. Over the night, this tree seemed to die… and when the brothers used an axe to try to cut it–the tree, it seems like, overnight, no longer lived. That’s why the big brother held the tree and cried, cried, cried. So the third brother asked, ‘Why are you crying?’

And the brother said, ‘See, even a tree understand human being because the tree thought you were going to chop it up, so that’s why it just died. Even trees have feelings, so why do our brothers want to divide our property into three parts?’

That’s why the big brother said, ‘Why don’t we not divide it into three. We still stay in the same family.’

After they said that, the tree came back to life!

So, actually, the flower of Hong Kong is from this kind of tree. So the reason they select this tree flower as a Hong Kong symbol is actually based upon this Asian story.”

This is an interesting story to me because if the Hong Kong flower is truly based on this story, it would make a lot of sense because the idea that Hong Kong is part of China, but they have two different systems, just as the brothers all decided to be one family and just live their own lives, as opposed to trying to completely separate into three different entities.

The Fox Borrows the Tiger’s Power

Nationality: Chinese
Age: 54
Occupation: Chinese teacher
Residence: Rhode Island
Performance Date: April 24, 2017
Primary Language: Chinese
Language: English

The 54-year-old informant is a elementary school Chinese teacher and is originally from Taiyuan, China. She’s been hearing and telling Chinese folklore her entire life, and often shares it with her students. Her stories represent Chinese culture and the qualities that Chinese people value.

“Once upon a time, there was a tiger in the mountain. Because basically, tiger is the king in this mountain. One day, the fox met the tiger, and the tiger wanted to eat the fox, and the fox said, ‘Oh, I am more powerful than you. Why do you want to eat me?’

And the tiger said, ‘Haha! You’re joking! You’re more powerful than me?’

The fox said, ‘Yes, of course. Do you want me to show you?’

And the tiger said, ‘Yes, show me.’

Then the fox said, ‘Okay, you just come along with me. I’m go back to my home–my forest. My section of this mountain.’

So the fox casually and very enjoyably walked to the other side of the mountain, and the tiger followed him. Once the fox reached his territory, all the animals on the tree and the ground all ran away. The fox said, ‘Did you see that? Once I arrived here, they all ran away. Because they’re afraid of me!'”

 

In Chinese, idioms are commonly 4-word phrases that represent stories. This story is based on the Chinese idiom: 狐假虎威 (hu jia hu wei), which means “a fox exploits a tiger’s power.” In much of folklore, foxes are commonly known to be clever and sometimes deceitful animals, which is again represented in this story.

 

The Old Man Who Lost His Horse

Nationality: Chinese
Age: 54
Occupation: Chinese teacher
Residence: Rhode Island
Performance Date: April 24, 2017
Primary Language: Chinese
Language: English

The 54-year-old informant is a elementary school Chinese teacher and is originally from Taiyuan, China. She’s been hearing and telling Chinese folklore her entire life, and often shares it with her students. Her stories represent Chinese culture and the qualities that Chinese people value.

“Once there was an old man that lived on the border of China and Mongolia. He had one horse that was very, very handsome in terms of height, strong-ness, and had a luscious mane. Very handsome. One day, the horse ran away. The man wanted to have a horse so he could breed and raise more similar horses, but it ran away! So he was very, very sad. He complained a lot.

But his neighbor said, ‘Well you lost your horse, but it doesn’t mean it’s a bad thing! It may be a good thing.’ But the man was still sad about his horse because it was a good horse and he shouldn’t have lost it because it was so good, so strong. Also, a lot of people admired him because of that horse.

And after a couple of weeks, the horse came back! And it brought a group of horses back to his home. The man was very, very happy. The neighbor said, ‘See? You lost your horse–it doesn’t mean it’s a bad thing. Right now you got more horses, right?’ So the man was very happy. And his son was very snobby, saying, ‘See? My dad is doing very well. We have so many great-looking horses!’

One day, his song was riding the horses because those horses run fast, but guess what? Unfortunately, his son fell from the horse’s back and broke his legs. The father said, ‘So bad! We have a good, but it’s bad that you broke your legs.’ So the neighbor told him again, ‘It doesn’t mean that this is a bad thing.’

So around the border, you know, China and other countries often go to war. They fight each other, right? Since crippled people can’t be drafted in the army, the son was not drafted. In the whole village, he was the only man of his age to not be drafted. He married and also had grandsons for the old man. The neighbor said, ‘See? That’s not a bad thing. Everyone went off to war, and they might not come back.’ So, at least his son stayed with him, so this is not a bad thing.

The moral of this story is, when something appears to be a bad situation–it’s not necessarily a bad situation. It might be good! Bad situations change to good situations, good situations change to bad situations.”

This story emphasizes the idea of things that are “blessings in disguise.” This story describes positive, concrete events that come out of bad situations, but we as an audience can glean that we can always find the good in bad or undesirable situations, or the “silver lining,” if you will. And this goes for almost any situation.

High Achiever’s Story

Nationality: Chinese
Age: 54
Occupation: Chinese teacher
Residence: Rhode Island
Performance Date: April 24, 2017
Primary Language: Chinese
Language: English

The 54-year-old informant is a elementary school Chinese teacher and is originally from Taiyuan, China. She’s been hearing and telling Chinese folklore her entire life, and often shares it with her students. Her stories represent Chinese culture and the qualities that Chinese people value.

“Once upon a time, there was a young man who… uhm, passed a national test, and.. and his future will be very, very bright. So, suddenly, one lady knocked the door, and he opened the door, and that lady asked him, “Say, do you remember me?”

And uh, this young man said, “Oh yes! I remember you! And I remembered you rescued me and cured my illness.”

And the lady said, “Yes, that was me.”

She said, “Did you remember when you passed by our hometown on the way to the capital city that held the test, you were very, very sick. And one of the herb medical doctors said ‘We need one very special prescription that is probably somewhere, so then your illness can be cured.”

At this time, a lady– a young lady who’s sitting nearby and heard about it said ‘Wow it happens to be my family has one secret prescription. It might be cure your illness.’

So she found their family secret prescription and went to mountaintop and found every element on that prescription, and eventually, this young man was cured. After he was cured, he found he doesn’t want to go to capital city to take the test. He thought he recovered and stay here very comfortably. However, this young lady encouraged him and said, ‘Your future is set on the test. If you pass it, your future will be very, very bright. Why did you give up? You don’t need to give up.’

That man said, ‘Oh yes, probably you’re right.’ So he went to the test and he passed it. And I think he got the number one score. So that’s why he said to the young lady, ‘Thank you very much for rescuing me and curing my illness.’

However, on second thought, he looked at the young lady twice and thought, Wow this lady has very ordinary clothes–nothing special. I would find better girls with finer clothes to be my future wife instead of this lady.

So that’s why he turned around and said ‘Well, I don’t think you fit with my future lifestyle, so I would rather stop this kind of relationship.’

Then the girl was very sad and she left.

It was not long that this young man became ill. Same kind of illness caused by the same type of disease. He asked someone to look for this girl, but this girl was never found. So the man was not cured.

From this story, you can tell that anytime people help you– you should be thankful and not turn around and not recognize their kindness. There are a lot, a lot of similar stories like this in China, just to warn people to be thankful to people who provide convenience or help you. You should remember them and be thankful.”

 

This story has strong Chinese themes including, gratefulness and humbleness. These ideas are extremely important to Chinese culture and growing up, I was definitely taught the importance of these concepts.