Main Piece: Bryan: So at Bell High school the wrestling team had a tradition. So every year before the championship tournament every single team member… even coach…we would all bleach our hair. Some would do the whole head, like me. Some would do a stripe. Then the next day we would all have a huge lunch. Like I mean gigantic where would bring lots and lots of food into the wrestling room and we would all eat and just feast… then after we would huddle in a group and give thanks and well pray that we would win. Me: I have heard of people wrestlers bleaching their hair but I never heard about the feast. Bryan: Yea so actually… bleaching the hair is a thing for wrestlers. Like a lot of different schools do it, not just Bell. Me: Why do you bleach your hair and have a feast? Bryan: Just because we want to. Hahaha. I am just messing with you. It is actually like a luck and unity thing. By dying all of our hair, we like become one group. Also bleaching your hair is supposed to be lucky. I am not sure why. I would have to get back to you on that one. You know but the food and everything is for that unity. We are a team. Kinda like a family is made by doing this tradition. We pray for good luck but we also pray or everyone’s safety. I mean you could really get hurt wrestling. Me: Awesome. Would you say that this tradition is important to you? Bryan: Definitely… when I was still in the team it was like a day we all looked forward to. It sounds cliché but it was our teams way to say we are a family. Win or loose. Context: I had interviews Bryan the previous day and he the sent me a text message stating that he forgot to tell me about another tradition. I called Bryan around 3 pm on Aril 22, 2018. We talked through the cellphone and I used a voice recorder to capture everything. Background: Bryan was born in Guatemala but came to the Unites States when he was a baby. He was raised in a predominately Hispanic community. He is currently attending California State Long Beach where he is studying Philosophy. Analysis: The wrestling team tradition of dying their hair, having a feast, and praying displays folk belief. The team does not have evidence that this tradition provides luck to win and protection to the team; however they still do it every year. It is interesting to see a team be passionate about a superstition they only learned from their fellow teammates.
Monthly Archives: May 2018
Riddle about the Future
What is something that is always coming, but we will never get to? Tomorrow!!
This riddle is kind of tricky but one of those sayings that it is so obvious. Essentially, this riddle makes you think about what could potentially happen but you would never be able to get to, and there are so many possibilities for this. It could be about crossing an ocean, and never being able to get to the other side, but that’s actually possible. It could also be about going into space or and never getting to Mars, however it’s as simple as thinking about how we are always living in today and there’s a past present and future. Tomorrow is always going to be tomorrow, but we will never be up tomorrow because tomorrow will always be the day that you’re in, today.
Insight about Tomorrow
If you have one foot on yesterday, and one foot on tomorrow, you end up pee-peeing on today. Be present.
This quote was told to me by my brother. He is a very wise person and has a lot of insight for saying this under his sleeve. This was told to him likely by our father, which is surprising because I had never heard it before. The meaning of this saying is implying that if you focus on yesterday and tomorrow, you can never focus on what happens today. It mainly is telling the audience to be present and focus on where you are in your current moment. There are many quotes about being present, however, this one is particularly special because it has a joke and connotation to it. It talks about peeing which makes it have a lighter tone and my intrigue audiences to respond to it more than they would a more serious quote.
Kings, A Drinking Game
Kings is a game where you use each card in a deck of cards to represent a different drinking rule. This was told me by my older friends who experienced drinking before I. This game was talk to me by one of my friends. We always hang out and find things to do in the summer, a lot of them are drinking socially. One of our favorite games is called Kings. In this game it is basically a random way of making everybody in the group drink, by following rules based on a classic deck of cards. This game is really fun to play because there’s not many guidelines however you can make the game as fun or intense as you want it to be. The rules are pretty self-explanatory, and it’s a really fun game to play to pass time, enjoy great laughs, and to get drunk. We play this game in New York City, and I have tried to introduce this game to some of my friends, who have never even heard of it. It is really interesting to think of the geographic boundaries that games have been passed down. There are also other drinking games that I do not know that are played in other regions of the country, which shows the diversity amongst verbal folklore.
Matzah Ball Soup
“First I bake the chicken and then cut the chicken off the bones, into cubes. I changed this part of the recipe from what my mom did. Grandma always puts the whole chicken in the soup but I never ate the chicken meat because it was always dry that way. Add whole Potato, yellow onion, turnip, parsnip, a handful of parsley, 1 leek, peppercorns, salt and pepper to taste. Put the chicken aside and put the bones in the pot with broth, bouillon cube, and water and veggies. Cook 2-3 hours. Strain out the peppercorns and all the veggies, add carrots and celery during the last 15 minutes of cooking and then add the chicken later.
As Jewish tradition, having Matzoth ball soup in the fridge is a staple. If it wasn’t in the fridge, it was frozen and ready to be defrosted. This soup is traditionally served during the Jewish holiday of Passover; a time that commemorates the liberation of Israelites from Egyptian slavery, which lasts eight days. During this time, individuals are not supposed to eat bread; they primarily consume various meals and snacks are made with matzah. While chicken soup can be made at any point in the year, adding matzah balls to the soup makes is a classic Passover tradition. There are many different variations and there is not a “right” way to make this recipe or how the soup should taste, however, it is very typical for people to say things like “my Mom’s soup is the best ever” and have joking argument about it.
It is common for recipes to be passed down through generations of families, especially when they are related to rituals and ceremonies. I personally have grown up cooking with my mother and from a young age I knew this recipe by heart. She told me that her mother taught her the recipe, and made modifications to it which she then taught me