Author Archives: gboyd

Happy Birthday sung in three languages

Nationality: Taiwanese-American
Age: 20
Occupation: Animation student
Residence: Los Angeles, CA / Queens, NY
Language: English

Text:

JC: “Okay, so um… for context, well you know this but my parents were originally from Taiwan, but my dad grew up in Costa Rica, so he’s picked up an understanding of Spanish. And in my family, we had this big group of like… in a lot of holiday celebrations, so like New Years or in the summer, we all tend to gather around and like, celebrate a specific holiday. And as a tradition we sing happy birthday first in English, ’cause everyone understands it, and then in Chinese to kind of like.. just for all the grandparents to understand, for them to join in, and for.. all of the like, Taiwanese people around. And then for the Costa Rican side, we end up singing it in Spanish.”

Context:

Informant JC is part of a multi-cultural and multi-lingual family. He added, “I always thought that was very interesting, like my family dynamic. I’m primarily Taiwanese-American, but we still ended up incorporating like a lot of Costa Rican cultural bits. There’s like, having Costa Rican food on the side, or being more open to Costa Rican culture. I also feel like because we’ve all like, grown up in America, like my parents moved when they were very young, and my relatives came in more progressively, and they’ve had to assimilate to American culture. A lot of what we end up doing feels very American.”

Analysis:

Happy Birthday songs are ritualized celebrations of the human life cycle, commemorating the completion of an approximate solar year since a person’s birth. They provide an opportunity for one’s community to get together and reaffirm their bonds with a person.

JC’s multilingual birthday ritual is especially significant in light of broader political changes. From 1949 to 2007, Costa Rica had diplomatic relations with Taiwan. After nearly 60 years, Costa Rica decided to break off this relationship in favor of establishing ties with China. Despite these shifting political alliances, JC’s family birthday ritual demonstrates that community bonds extend beyond the borders and interests of the nation-state.

Tang Yuan

Nationality: Taiwanese-American
Age: 20
Occupation: Animation Student
Residence: Los Angeles, CA / Queens, NY
Language: English

Text:

“One of the foods that we made is um.. Tang Yuan, which is like a… kind of like mochi? It’s like a glutinous rice ball and then on the inside is sesame paste. And so, it… it’s usually typically eaten during the New Year. Um… it’s just like kind of a dessert. I know it’s been more popularized within like, um… like, Taiwanese dessert places nowadays, or like dessert places in general, but they’re usually served as like a treat for introducing the New Year. Um… a while ago, like when I was really really young — I’d say like before I was five — my grandma used to make Tang Yuan by like… She didn’t have the sesame paste, it was just like flour balls, I guess? Like she’d make the sort of like, dough out of rice flour and water and then she’d dye it into different colors and like, cut it up into strips and then she’d have me and my cousins like prepare the dough balls together. And then she’d prepare a kind of uh, kind of soup, like a sweet soup to go with it. Um… I believe also typically… I prefer to eat it plain, but my dad um… My grandparents on my dad’s side — and my dad — they both kind of… they have like a somewhat Cantonese background, so they end up drinking it with like, this fermented wine, like rice wine. And it… has an ‘interesting’ taste, it’s like… it’s like the sweetness of the Tang Yuan on itself is pretty good, and it’s like, the fermented rice wine is very bitter, and very pungent…. and so it’s like, I don’t know how they acquired the taste for it but, um, my dad typically eats it with this sort of rice wine. And also, when you eat it… I think it represents currency. ’cause the ‘yuan’ at the end… and ‘tang’ is usually like ‘sweet.’ So like ‘sweet money.'”

Context:

Tang Yuan are a traditional Chinese dessert, although they can be sweet or savory. They are often made for holidays and festivals, especially the Lunar New Year. There are several variations on Tang Yuan recipes, but the most common one involves making a dough out of glutenous rice flour and water, stuffing the dough balls with a sweet black sesame paste, boiling, and serving warm in a sweet syrup. Tang Yuan are said to represent togetherness and completeness.

Analysis:

Dishes like Tang Yuan are often made for festivals to commemorate calendar cycles and bring people together. They represent connections to community and a sense of continuity of tradition and culture. For informant JC, Tang Yuan are a dish that holds significance beyond the process of cooking and eating — they play a role in connecting him to his Taiwanese identity as he and his family navigate American culture and expectations of assimilation.

Adventist Communion Bread

Nationality: American
Age: 55
Occupation: Marriage & Family Therapist
Residence: Forest Falls, CA
Language: English

Text:

JB: “There’s a recipe for making Seventh-day Adventist communion bread, and there’s a tradition that whatever you don’t use, you’re supposed to take it outside and burn it. I think that some churches still do this – I don’t actually know. It’s supposed to be whole grain flour, salt, water, and oil. I think that because it’s been blessed, it shouldn’t be used for any purpose other than communion. I think it’s an Adventist tradition. And the recipe for the bread, I think it’s… you can either do part whole wheat flour and white flour or you can do all whole wheat flour. And then.. I don’t know the precise amounts but some salt, some water and some oil. And then you want it to be a pretty firm dough, you roll it out. A lot of times people will kind of score it and then bake it till it’s firm.”

Context:

Informant JB was raised in the Seventh-day Adventist church, which is a branch of Protestant Christianity that is distinct for its dietary restrictions and emphasis on the Sabbath. For Adventists, communion is a symbolic act of consuming the body (as unleavened bread) and blood (as grape juice — Adventists typically do not consume alcohol) of Jesus to commemorate his crucifixion. JB suggested that the tradition of burning leftover communion bread because according to the Bible, Christ’s body did not decay in the tomb.

Analysis:

The ritual preparation and burning of the unleavened bread reflects the church’s intentions to set apart the bread as sacred. Sometimes the leftover grape juice is also poured out. Interestingly, these acts are considered grave sins in the Catholic church, as the bread and wine which are blessed during Mass are believed to be literal manifestations of Christ’s body and blood. Leftover Eucharist is typically consumed by the priest or dissolved in water and disposed of in a respectful manner. This reversal of meaning reflects the broader Protestant departure from Catholic beliefs as well as the particular bias in the Adventist community against the Catholic church. Overall, this tradition points to the nature of reactionary movements in the history of religion as well as performances of sacredness in religious communities.

How to cure a cold (with optimism)

Nationality: American
Age: 59
Occupation: Psychology Professor
Residence: Forest Falls, CA
Language: English

Text:

“My cure to the cold is to drink lots of fluids, like tea, and to have an optimistic mental attitude. I synthesized this from drinking lots of fluids being good for you and tea kind of being a good warm…. like tea, so warm fluids being good, and the… I can’t remember where it is… and a combination of the Bible, in Proverbs or wherever it is, and kind of the medical stuff like… I don’t know. It seems like you can release endorphins, I don’t know if ‘endorphins’ is the right thing, but it seems like you can fight off infections that way. So I just put this stuff together and thought that you could have this optimistic attitude to fight off what’s coming. But it seems to me like it only works at the tipping point, like it could be right at the balance. But once you’re sick, you’re sick.”

Context:

Informant KB is a highly educated individual and has a background of studying psychology and religion. He was also raised in the Seventh-day Adventist church, which is distinct for its emphasis on health and dietary restrictions. Despite general anti-science and anti-evolution tendencies in the Adventist church, KB is an adamant believer in synthesizing his faith with the findings and practices of the scientific community. As for Biblical references, KB may be referring to Proverbs 17:22, which reads, “A joyful heart is good medicine, but a crushed spirit dries up the bones.”

Analysis:

Cures to the common cold are numerous and variable, especially because there is currently no institutionally recognized cure. KB’s hypothesis is representative of the nature of folklore as “might be right” knowledge. KB draws on his background in psychology, citing the potential healing power of endorphins in response to a positive mindset. However, this particular cure implies that if one does not succeed in being optimistic enough, they are responsible for their own fall into illness. This may or may not intentionally parallel the common Christian view that if one does not take responsibility for their ‘sinful’ human nature, they are responsible for their eternal damnation.

How to make Gluten

Nationality: American
Age: 55
Occupation: Marriage & Family Therapist
Residence: Forest Falls, CA
Language: English

Text:

JB: “Okay, you’re gonna start with some gluten flour, however much gluten you want to make, otherwise known as ‘dough pep’. And then I mix in a couple handfuls of usually whole wheat flour — I think it gives it more flavor — and then you mix it up dry. And then you add in cold water, and you want to be mixing it up while you add it so it doesn’t turn into glue too much, and then you want to mix it up into a ball that holds together that is a little soft, not too gluey. And then you can kind of let that sit in water. And then you’re gonna make a ‘witch’s brew’ [smiles and laughs] — however you wanna make a really strong broth. Whatever you got to make a really strong witch’s brew of a broth. I like to use Vegex [a brand of yeast extract] and soy sauce, I usually chop up an onion, umm.. might add some different powders, like packets of George Washington broth I’ll put in, like onion powder, sometimes I’ll put in barbeque sauce? I’m sure there’s other things too. You can use like the box vegetable broth. But a witch’s brew. And then you tear up the chunks of dough, make little balls and kind of flatten them out, and drop the dough in  — well you want to get the witch’s brew boiling first — and then you drop in the bits of dough and boil it for about 45 minutes. And then after you’ve cooked it in the broth, I like to store it in the broth so it kind of marinates and absorbs the flavor, and then you can do whatever you want with it. I usually make it for special occasions, like Thanksgiving and Christmas.”

[JB’s husband]: “It’s too bad you don’t do it for Adventist-specific days. You should be doing it every October 22 for the Great Disappointment.”

Context:

Informant JB was raised in the Seventh-day Adventist church, which is a denomination of Protestant Christianity that is distinct for its emphasis on vegetarianism, health, and the Sabbath. The ‘Great Disappointment’ refers a date in 1844 on which the Millerites, a 19th century religious movement, falsely believed that Jesus would return to Earth. The reference to a ‘witch’s brew’ was especially humorous in the context of Adventist culture because witchcraft and ‘spiritualism’ are taboo subjects. She also shared further details on where she learned the recipe and its significance in the Seventh-day Adventist community:

“I learned the Gluten recipe from my mom. She usually made it for special occasions. Mom [husband’s mother] also made Gluten. I think a lot of Adventist people made it, that was their special Thanksgiving dinner. [Gets old cookbook from the kitchen] In An Apple A Day, the Gluten recipe is listed under ‘Mrs. Robert Chung’. This is the most traditional Seventh-day Adventist cookbook, and it was put together by doctors’ wives. Because it was so traditional, they didn’t even write the women’s names, just ‘Mrs.’ and then their husband’s name. This was my mom’s, but every good Adventist had this. Sold at the ABC bookstore, everybody had it. Adventists have been pretty good cooks in my experience. I mean, they had to kind of reassess their approach to cooking. I think they embraced probably ethnic foods in earlier parts of American culture.”

Analysis:

Gluten serves as a replacement for meat-based holiday dishes for many Seventh-day Adventist community members. Interestingly, the process for making ‘Gluten’ is very similar to the process of making seitan, a dish that is traced back to ancient China and is believed to have been invented by Chinese Buddhist monks who followed a vegetarian diet. This potential connection is further reinforced by the authored version of the recipe in the An Apple A Day cookbook, listed by a person with an East Asian surname. The Seventh-day Adventist church’s early days also coincided with Chinese and Japanese migration to America the the early 20th century. Whether via evangelizing or close contact, the practice of making a gluten-based meat substitute likely spread to Euro-Americans during this time.