Monthly Archives: May 2019

Tapping Fingers While Receiving Tea

Nationality: Chinese
Age: 20
Occupation: Student
Residence: Los Angeles
Performance Date: 2-17-19
Primary Language: English
Language: Chinese

Background Info/Context:

My friends and I were out to dinner at a Korean Chinese-Style restaurant to get some noodles, and the waitress brought us a pot of tea. I started pouring into my friends’ cups, and I noticed that my Chinese friend was tapping her index finger and middle finger together on the table as I was pouring. So I asked her what she was doing, figuring that she was feeling restless or wanting to test the stickiness of the table. She surprisingly said, “You’ve never seen someone do this?” And when my other friend and I both shook our heads “no,” she told us why she did that. This is a practice that her uncle taught her to do when she was young.

 

Piece:

Friend: “Today in Chinese restaurants, when anyone pours tea for you, you have to use your two fingers and like tap the table next to your cup.”

 

Me: “As you’re pouring?”

 

Friend: “As the person’s pouring for you. You have to say “Thank you” to them by tapping your fingers like this *right index and middle finger and held out and touching, as they lightly tap the area next to her cup.* You could also knock your two fingers on the table.

 

Me: “So you do this if an older person if pouring for you?”

 

Friend: “No, I think if anyone does it for you. It’s just a way of saying “Thank you,” cuz you say “Thank you” to everyone. So the reasoning behind that is that like way back, in one of the dynasties, I don’t remember which one, but the king would have to like go out of the palace to like do stuff right. He can’t just stay in his home forever. So whenever he goes out, and he doesn’t want to be recognized, but let’s say he has lunch at a restaurant outside. Um, when he doesn’t want to be recognized, and no one’s allowed to bow to him, cuz it would just give it away. So instead of bowing to him, if anyone sees him and recognizes him, they would just like do this *taps two fingers on the table.* Or like subtle. So like kneeling right? So instead of bowing you kneel to the emperor. So they do this instead, to make it subtler. So now it’s like if anyone, it’s just a sign of respect.”


Thoughts:
I really enjoyed this piece of folklore that my friend shared, because I had no idea that this was a common practice. I have never seen any of my friends tap their fingers or knuckles on the table, probably because it’s more of a traditional Chinese thing to do, rather than just verbally stating “Thank you.” I interpret this act to reiterate Chinese culture of respect for elders.

“Contradictory” (Origin of the word in Chinese)

Nationality: Chinese
Age: 21
Occupation: Student
Residence: Los Angeles
Performance Date: 2-10-19
Primary Language: English
Language: Chinese

Background Info/Context:

A few friends and I were talking about different words in our own respective languages. For example, in Korean, a booger is called “코딱지” which literally translates to two separate words that mean “nose” and “sticky thing.” So my friend piped in saying that there was something similar in Chinese for the word “contradictory,” but needed to tell the story in order for us to understand.

 

Piece:

“In Chinese, the word for “contradictory” directly translates to “spear” “shield”– “mao thun.” Individually, the words mean “spear” and “shield,” but when you put them together, it means “contradictory,” and that’s because a long time ago, there was this Chinese salesmen, and he was selling like military armor and everything.

So he was walking down the street like “Hi everyone! Buy my spear! It’s the best spear ever! It can like pierce through anything in the world. It’s so strong” blah blah blah. And people would buy it. The next day, he would sell his shield. Like “Everyone, buy my shield! It’s the best shield ever, nothing can pierce through this.”

And then people are like “Hold on. Like you just said that you had the best spear in the world and it can pierce through anything. Would your spear pierce through your shield?” And so he was just kinda stuck like “Oh shoot, I don’t know.”

 

 

Thoughts:

I think this story is a nice way to help people remember this word in Mandarin. Many “compound” words in Korean actually mean what the words that are combined actually describe, but it was interesting to listen to this story about the word “contradictory,” and see how the meaning of this “compound” word in Chinese means something entirely differently to its parts.

I can see this story also serving as a lesson to people who are hypocritical or contradictory. More broadly, you shouldn’t say one thing and do another. For example, gossiping to one friend about someone else and then going to that other person and gossiping about their friend is bound to catch up to you.

Click this link to watch a different version of this story on Youtube: https://gbtimes.com/swords-shields-and-chinese-contradiction.

The New York Rat King

Nationality: Thai
Age: 22
Residence: Los Angeles
Performance Date: 30 January 2019
Primary Language: English
Language: Thai

Background Info/Context:

At a party, a group of friends and I were talking about Ratatouille the movie, and my friend brought up another story he knows about rats. This is a legend that he heard throughout middle school and high school from classmates while growing up in New York. He’s never seen it himself, and never wants to.

 

Piece:

“This is a legendary being that lives in New York, called the Rat King. So, the Rat King, is what happens when a bunch of rats get stuck in a room, and uh, as they squirm around each other, their tails get tied together. And eventually they’re all tied together, and they become the rat king. But because they’re tied together, only one of them can survive. So the other, so the one rat, survives, by eating the bodies that are tied to him and drags it around, as he, or she, walks, like scurries, around New York. Just a rat tied to a bunch of maimed and um eaten, half-eaten, other rats. And sometimes they say that, if you look really hard into the subway tracks, especially the ones around Times Square, you can see the Rat King scurrying with his tail tied to all the other dead bodies.”

 

Thoughts:

This piece of folklore seems very believable, as there are millions of rats living in confined spaces in New York. However, there doesn’t seem to be any live evidence of one Rat King eating its way to “freedom” and control. This legend makes my skin crawl, and that’s probably its main purpose. As this is a story that was apparently heavily shared in middle school to freak people out.

 

There are gods in Rice

Nationality: Chinese
Age: 18
Residence: Los Angeles
Performance Date: 20 April 2019
Primary Language: Chinese
Language: English

Background Info/Context:

Yigi and I were chatting about things that parents have said to their kids to make sure they were being studious, obedient, or respectful. She told me about a story that she heard that parents told children to make sure they finished their food.

 

Piece:

Yigi – “Parents would tell me that in each rice, there lives a little god. And if you waste any, they will be upset and bring you bad luck, so you have to finish your food.”

 

Sophia – “Did you believe that as a kid?”

 

Y – “Uh, my parents didn’t tell me that story, and a friend of mine told me about it.”   

 

Thoughts:

Children, including myself, don’t usually think about waste and often have tendencies to leave one bite of food, or be greedy and spoon a lot onto their plates and not end up finishing at the end of the meal. This story was probably told to children to scare them into finishing all of their food, but more importantly, to not be wasteful. Luck is heavily tied in Chinese culture, and people try to bring as much of it towards them as they can, by wearing red, having statues of dragons, etc. So bringing about bad luck by wasting food would be squandering the other efforts they’ve put to bring luck to them.

 

The Pregnancy Dream

Nationality: Korean
Age: 48
Occupation: Co-Business Owner
Residence: Texas
Performance Date: 24 April 2019
Primary Language: Korean
Language: English

Background Info/Context:

My mom told me that when she was pregnant with me and my younger sister, she had a very distinct dream about each of us. Korean people call this pregnancy dream, 태몽 (pronounced tae mong). This apparently happens most frequently, to the mother, but often times the family or close friends. The dream uncovers some insight about the baby that is imminent.

 

Piece:

Korean:

Sophia-

내가 임신하기 전에 꿈을 꿨는데,

아침에 아파트 수영장에 나갔는데, 수영장에 큰 검은 물고기가 하나 가득있었어.

나는 그중에 제일 큰거를 한마리 잡아서 들고 왔는데, 엄청 크고 빛났었어.

그 얘기를 엄마한테 했는데 엄마가 태몽이라하더라고.

 

Jamie-

연수는 임신하고도 태몽을 안꿔서…

누구 내 태몽 꾼사람 없나… 하고 있었는데,

한국에 있는 친구가 갑자기 전화가 와서 나보고 임신했냐고 묻더라고,

내가 어떻게 알았냐고 물었더니,

내가 걔 꿈에 나와서 엄청큰 보석반지를 끼고 예쁘다고 자랑을 했다하더라고…

 

태몽은 예전에 아기 낳기전에 아들인지 딸인지 몰랐는데 알고싶으니까

태몽으로 아기 성별을 맞춰보곤했지

너희 꿈은 둘다 딸꿈

 

English Transcription:

Sophia-

Nae gah eem shin ha gi jun aye koom uhl kuh nun dae,

Ah chim aye ah pah tuh soo young jang aye nah gat nnun dae, soo young jang aye kun kum uhn mool go gi gah ha nah gah tuhk ees suh suh.

Nah nun guh joong aye jae il kun guh rur han mah ri jab ah suh dul go oah nun dae, um chung kuh go beet nah sus suh.

Guh yea gi rur umma han tae het nun dae umma ga tae mong ee ra ha duh rah go.

 

Jamie-

Yon soo nun eem shin ha go do tae mong ul an koouh su…

Noo goo nae tae mong koon sa ram ub na… ha go eet sus nun dae,

Han gook aye eet nun chin goo ga gap cha gi jun hwa ga owa suh nah bo go eem shin han nya go moot du ra go,

Nae ga uh dduh kae al at nya go mul ut duh ni,

Nae gah gae goom eh nah owa suh um chung kuhn bo suk ban ji rur yeah buh da go ja rang ul het da ha duh rah go…

 

Tae mong uhn yeh jun aye ah gi nat gi jun eh ah dul een ji tal een ji mol lat nun dae al go ship uh ni ka

Tae mong uh roe ah gi sung byul ul mat chi bo gon het ji

Nuh hi goom un dool da tal koom

 

Transliteration:

Sophia-

When I pregnant before dream had,

Morning apartment swimming pool outside went, swimming pool inside big blackfish one full.

I between most big one catch and carry came, very big shiny.

This story mom told she tae mong it is.

 

Jamie-

Yeonsoo (my sister’s Korean name) pregnant after tae mong not…

Someone my tae mong dreamt wonder… thought had,

Korea in friend suddenly call came me pregnant asking,

I how did you know asked,

I her dream in came out very big

 

Tae mong is long time ago baby before born son is or daughter is did not know wants to know. Tae mong with baby gender guess. You all dream both daughter dream.

 

English Translation:

Sophia-

Before I was pregnant I had this dream. It was the morning, and I went out to the apartment pool. In the pool, there were a ton of big, black fish. Out of all of them, I caught the biggest one and carried it back. It was so big and shiny. I told this story to my mom and she said it was a “tae mong.”

 

Jamie-

When I was pregnant with Yeonsoo (Jamie’s Korean name), I did not dream a “tae mong.” But while I wondering if someone else dreamt a “tae mong” for me, I suddenly got a call from my friend in Korea. She asked me if I was pregnant. I asked her how she knew, and she said I appeared in her dream and was bragging about a giant jeweled ring.

 

Tae mong was used a long time ago before a baby was born to try to guess if it would be a boy or a girl. They used tae mong to try to match the baby’s gender. My dreams about both you and your sister were daughter dreams.

 

Thoughts:

As I’ve never been pregnant before, I cannot attest to the gut feeling of when a dream specifically pertains to an unborn child. But this is a phenomenon that I’ve heard from multiple adult women. In fact, my photography professor’s mother, who is also Korean, stated that she’s heard that if the object in the dream that represents the child is small, the baby is male, but if that object is big, it will be female.

The distinct pregnancy dream may be a result of a combination of a multi-generational herd behavior and confirmation bias. When you hear that mothers and people around you have had strange dreams about an unborn child, you may think that one of the dreams you’ve had is related to theirs, snowballing the herd mentality.

This folk practice has been around for a long time, as implied by my mom, when she stated that pregnancy dreams were used as a method to try to guess a baby’s gender before there were ultrasounds and other technological advances. Although the accuracy of them is unknown, these dreams are remembered and shared with friends and family, even after many years.