Monthly Archives: May 2023

The Wishbone of Thanksgiving Dinner

Background:
The informant is a 20-year-old man who lives in California. When asked about tradition on holidays, he told the collector about the wishbone tradition that he and his family have.

Text:
Collector: Can you tell me some traditions that you and your family do on holidays?

Informant: Well, the only thing I can think of right now is the wishbone.

Collector: Ok tell me about that.

Informant: When you carve the turkey during Thanksgiving dinner, you take the wishbone… this specific v-shape chest bone out and put it in a cup to dry completely, which usually would be the case after a day or two. After it’s completely dried, two people get to pull each side of the bone and whoever gets the bigger piece gets to make a wish. I remember I wished for a lot of money one time when I was in middle school.

Analysis:
The wishbone tradition on Thanksgiving is a common practice in American households. The informant describes the specific tradition in his family that involves drying the bone and the idea of who has the right to make a wish. There are a lot of variations of this tradition: for instance, two people should wish at the same time and whoever gets the bigger piece will have their wish granted (see this article for reference). The wishbone tradition came from Etruscans hoping to gain divine power through the wishbone and Romans decided to crack the bones so everyone can have a piece (see this article for reference). It is interesting to see the European tradition of cracking the wishbone migrate across the Atlantic Ocean and blend into the American Holiday of Thanksgiving.

乖乖 the Taiwanese Snacks

Background:
The informant is a 21-year-old woman who lives in Taiwan. When asked about some folk beliefs that she knows, she told the collector about a superstition regarding a brand of Taiwanese snacks and machines.

Text:
Collector: Do you know any folk beliefs?

Informant: Oh yeah. This happened couple days ago in the office where I’m interning for. There was this copy machine that was always jammed and apparently the manager tried to fix it many times already. The machine was jammed again and after the manager fixed it, he asked me to grab a bag of 乖乖 (kuai kuai) from convenience store.

Collector: Can you describe what 乖乖 is and why did he ask you to do so?

Informant: 乖乖 is this snack made out of corn i think. It has many different flavors and it’s really popular in Taiwan. As of why he told me to do that, it’s because the brand name 乖乖 means to be obedient. He put the 乖乖 on top of the copy machine to tell the machine to behave. I know a lot of other occupations do the same thing. I’ve seen bus drivers, scientists, and some stores on top of their cash registers.

Analysis:
The Taiwanese folk belief regarding the snack 乖乖 and machines is a form of homeopathic magic. By putting something that literally says “behave” on top of something that is not behaving, the performer of the magic attempts to change the current status of a machine according to his or her want, which is for the machine to stop malfunctioning. Besides magic, reception theory proposed by Stuart Hall can be utilized to further analyze the popular superstition in Taiwan. 乖乖 is a snack that is meant to be eaten; however, the consumers of the snack give a new meaning towards the product that the producer never intended for it to be. For more information and picture reference, please read this BBC article.

Spanish New Year Tradition: Eating 12 Grapes

Context:
The informant is a 20-year-old guy living in California. His mother’s side of the family is Spanish and his family still practice some Spanish traditions in their American household.

Text:
Informant: Basically, at midnight on New Year’s Eve, when the clock strikes twelve, we will eat 12 grapes. Each of them symbolizes a month in the upcoming year, so it’s important that you eat all 12 of them. It gives you good luck.
Collector: Does it matter whether they are green grapes or purple ones?
Informant: I don’t think so. Although I heard my mom say that you should eat the grapes along with the bell trikes. Well, we don’t get that here in California, so we kind of just eat them one by one.

Analysis:
In Spain, there are a great variety of grapes and grapes are important to their agriculture and wineries. Grapes are most likely a symbol of prosperity. According to the article in Atlas Obscura, the tradition might come from a clever farmer’s marketing strategy to digest a surplus harvest, or from an imitation of French customs acted by the bourgeoisie in Spain. Regardless of the origin, Spanish people see this tradition as a way to avoid bad luck and bring good luck for the upcoming year. This idea of 12 grapes symbolizing 12 months can be seen as homeopathic magic, meaning that the people would have grapes, or other crops, to harvest every month in the upcoming year. Some parts of this tradition are lost in the informant’s family since they emigrated from Spain to the United States; however, they still continue to perform this tradition each year to remember their cultural roots and cultural identity.

Hotel Cecil and Elisa Lam

Nationality: USA and Mexico
Age: 20
Occupation: Student
Residence: San Diego
Performance Date: 4/5
Primary Language: English
Language: Spanish

Context:
The informant is a 20 year old female college student at USC. The performance took place in her dorm room.

Text:
Informant: About 10 years ago, there was a girl who died in a hotel right around here in downtown LA. The footage of her acting weirdly in the elevator was all over the Internet. Some people said that she was possessed by demon and other said that she’s crazy. Her body was later found in the water tank at the hotel couple months later. I don’t really know if they’ve figured out what happened to her, but people said that the hotel has been haunted ever since.

Analysis:
The death of Elisa Lam is one of the famous unsolved mystery that happened in Los Angeles. The legend of haunted places often occurred after peculiar death or suicide. Because of the Internet, the legend has spread worldwide. The building has been renovated into affordable housing complex to help the local unhoused population, though most of the rooms remain empty (https://www.latimes.com/california/cecil-hotel-housing-vouchers-latt-123). The history of the hotel is extremely bothering, see link https://thecrimewire.com/multifarious/Los-Angeles-Cecil-Hotel. The video mentioned by informant, see link https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3TjVBpyTeZM (trigger warning: unsettling scene)

The legend of Green Mist in Chino Hills

Nationality: USA
Age: 53
Occupation: Soccer Coach
Residence: Lafayette, CA
Performance Date: 4/4
Primary Language: English

Context:
The performer is a 53 year old male who grew up in Chino Hills. At a family dinner, he told the story about the place he grew up to his three kids, his wife, and a guest.

Text:
A green eerie mist that would cover the ground in chino hills. Chino hills “Hill of Hope” cult compound. This was a real place located deep in the hills and very hard to get to. We had to off road and hike in. It was a fenced compound with guards. There were also rumors of military experiment. I heard about that since I was a kid and I read about an article couple years ago confirming the rumor. But when I was little, no one knows what was happening there and all the young people like to drive up there to do like a dare or something. It’s almost like all the kids have to do it… before they graduate from high school or something. It was really creepy, like straight out of a horror movie. It’s not like that anymore…… They stop experimenting there for couple decades now.

Analysis:
Legends often happen around military-related locations because the secrecy involved could provoke wild imagination. It is also possible that the military base fueled the rumors in order to keep people away from the area. The rumor of a cult in the midst of green eerie mist on top of unknown military experiments also makes the place even more strange and mysterious. This legend was used to keep people out of certain places, but it made people want to challenge the legend more. The legend also developed a legend quest that associates with it and it usually takes place on the verge of transitioning from childhood and adulthood.