Author Archives: Nicola Carreon

Swallowing Gum

Nationality: American
Age: 30
Occupation: Weightlifting Coach
Residence: Downtown LA
Performance Date: 5.1.14
Primary Language: English

The Informant is 30 years old, happily married, and I know him through my affiliation with a gym off campus.

Him: My parents always told me not to swallow gum when I was little.

Me: Or else what?

Him: Well, they said that you can’t digest it. So after swallowing a bunch of gum, my tummy would just get full of it and get clogged and then I’d die.

Me: They said you’d die from swallowing too much gum?

Him: Yep. I was deathly afraid to chew it until I was like 17 or something. Until I realized that you don’t die from swallowing gum.

Me: Why did they tell you that?

Him: When I was little I wouldn’t chew gum, I’d just eat it like it was food. So I think that was their way of teaching me how to do it right. But instead it just scared me from ever having anything to do with it! Now I chew gum all of the time. And sometimes I swallow it, just ’cause.

Analysis:

I think it’s obvious that the Informant’s parents initially told him this story in order to discipline him so that he wouldn’t swallow gum. Unfortunately, the lesson was taken too strong to heart and it resulted in the Informant avoiding gum for about a decade. I think these methods of discipline are interesting in how they provide insight for how parents choose to discipline their children, and the ways in which they can backfire or effect the children’s psychology for years to come. It makes me wonder whether or not the Informant will pass down that lesson to his children. If anything, I think that lessons like that early on in the Informant’s life have led him into leading this sort of trickster lifestyle. Knowing the informant rather well, I can believe that he would try to fool people with small lies like “gum can kill you”, as a result of his learning that gum is basically harmless after believing for years that it is lethal.

Tibetan Mastiff

Nationality: American, Chinese
Age: 26
Occupation: Retail Worker
Residence: Downtown LA
Performance Date: 5.1.14
Primary Language: English
Language: Chinese

The Informant is in her mid-20’s and is a competitive weightlifter. I know her through my affiliation with a gym off- campus.

Her: Have you heard of Tibetan Mastiffs?

Me: What are they?

Her: There these legendary dogs that my dad used to tell me about in China. They’re totally real though. Not just legends. They’re these massive dogs that guard the temples in China and they’re super expensive. I think one sold for $1.6 million once.

Me: Do you have a story about one?

Her: Yeah! So there was this guy who worked in the temple, he was a monk, and he owned one of these Tibetan Mastiffs. He didn’t like the dog because he was so lazy and always sleeping and all of that stuff. But one day a wolf came into the temple and attacked the mastiff’s owner. But he survived. Then the mastiff left for 3 days and the owner didn’t see him at all. And on the third day when the mastiff came back he was covered in blood. He had killed the entire wolf-pack in the woods.

Me: So are these dogs known for their loyalty?

Her: Yeah, and their viciousness. They can kill anything.

Me: And they’re super valuable?

Her: Not outside of China. Outside of China I don’t think people really care about Tibetan Mastiffs. Their name is supposed to mean “snow lion” and the white Tibetan Mastiffs are the most rare and supposed to be the best.

Me: When did your dad tell you this?

Her: Well, I remember when we first got my dog, Jasmine, she’s a mutt. She’s like half wiener dog and half something else. Really small and energetic. My dad said something like I should’ve gotten a big dog instead, like the Tibetan Mastiffs and so he told me about them. I was like 12 or something.

Analysis:

This is a Chinese legend that was mentioned to the Informant as an acknowledgment of how her dog didn’t fit the ideal Chinese standards of what a dog should be. The Informant’s father still doesn’t approve of the dog to my knowledge because of the fact that it isn’t purebred and it isn’t a warrior hound. According to Google, Tibetan Mastiffs are an ancient breed that were known as defenders, but now are domesticated dogs, no longer known for their fighting skills. It’s always been known as a type of guard dog that watches over herds, temples, and families. Many of the ancient stories talk about the Tibetan Mastiff’s ability to fight off enemies, further showing the dog’s loyalty to those that it protects.

Theatre Camp – Horror Story

Nationality: American, Brazilian
Age: 20
Occupation: Student
Residence: Downtown LA
Performance Date: 4.22.14
Primary Language: English

The Informant is 20 years old, a sophomore at USC studying Communications and Journalism, and is from New York, New York.

Her: Uhm. Okay. So, when I was like in middle school, like ages 11-14-ish, I used to go to this theatre camp every summer in like upstate New York. And, like, over a period of 5 weeks we’d put on a play. I don’t remember what play we did that year, but this was like my 3rd year and they always told the same story about this girl who died at the camp. They’d tell it the midnight before opening night.

Me: Is this like a yearly ritual?

Her: Oh, totally. Everyone was always stoked about it and the new girls would get scared because they didn’t know it was coming.

Me: What’s the story?

Her: So…okay. Let me think about this. Okay…I got it. So there was this girl that died backstage at the camp like 40 years ago because of a set piece that fell from the lighting truss or something like that, and she was a virgin, and they said that because she was never able to go back home after camp, her ghost still stays there in the woods. And they say that the night before opening night if you look out your cabin window and you’re a virgin you can see her in the woods staring at you into the cabin. Apparently she’s supposed to come out of the woods and like kill you or something. But, I don’t know. I was always too afraid to look out of the window and risk it *laughs*, but none of my friends who looked died!

Me: That is terrifying. So you never saw her?

Her: No, but my friend Charlie swears to God that she did. But she didn’t die or anything so I don’t know.

Me: How long have they been telling the story there?

Her: I’m not sure how long they’ve told the story, but even the girls that were 3rd years when I was a 1st year had been hearing it for awhile too. So I wanna say it’s at least been awhile. And the camp counselors were in on it, too.

Analysis:

Being that the Informant attended an all-girls theatre camp in a liminal age period (the onset of puberty), I can understand how stories like this became very popular. Especially with the specificity of the involvement of virgins in the process. It’s clear that stories like this are created to help unite the girls in a way that helps them cope with the onset of womanhood. Also, from my experience, stories like this can be fun to share with girls you don’t know that well yet because it can lead to the onset of friendships and bonding over similar fears and the adrenaline rushes that result from them. The development of relationships with people in your age, gender, and school groups are very important for young adults.

Rashid Family Grace

Nationality: American
Age: 21
Occupation: Student
Residence: Downtown LA
Performance Date: 4.22.14
Primary Language: English

The Informant is 21 years old, a junior at USC studying Dramatic Arts, and is from Evanston, Illinois.

Him: You know how a lot of people say grace before every meal? Like they pray to God to bless their food before they eat it and stuff? Well, my family have always said a different grace than my family friends and stuff. Every time I go to someone else’s house and they do grace, it’s different from my family’s. We say this prayer, ‘Bless us Our Lord, for these, thy gifts, which we are about to receive, through thy bounty, through Christ, Our Lord. Amen.’ I’ve never heard another family say it like us.

Me: That’s the one my family and I say!

Him: What, really? No way.

Me: I swear to God.

Him: Well, also, we do it for a different reason, I think. Like, my family has never said grace to bless the food. When I hear that other people do that, I don’t get it. We do it so that we can center the family and meet as one before we eat. Like, when I eat alone, I never do grace. I only do it when I’m with people. Like, why would I bless my food? I want to bless the company I’m with, you know? But yeah. No one does it like us in that regard. I don’t know if it’s always been that way, like I don’t know the actual reason why the Rashids started doing grace, probably for purely religious reasons, but that’s how I know it now.

Me: So in other words, it’s not for religion purposes, it’s about bringing the family together.

Him: Yeah! Like, we don’t go to church or anything like that at all. And I don’t really pray or anything. But when I’m with my family, I say grace with them for the purpose of being closer to them.

Analysis:

This shows the ways that prayer can bring non-religious families together with different intentions. By seeking to bless the family  rather than the food, the Informant’s family place a larger emphasis on their company and their bloodlines than on the sustenance that has been provided. In other words, they probably also value family quality time over income and time spent at work. Knowing the informant rather well, I can affirm this. The Informant spends as much time as he can with his family, probably because the significance of family has been instilled in him since a very young age.

It’d be interesting to compare the familial closeness of an orthodox catholic family, where prayers may strictly be followed based off of their original intentions, with the Informant’s family where tangible experiences with the present company are the ones that are most valued.

Pre-Show Chant

Nationality: American, Polish, French
Age: 22
Occupation: Student
Residence: Downtown LA
Performance Date: 4.21.14
Primary Language: English

The Informant is a 22 year old male, a senior at USC, and was born and raised in Manhattan Beach, CA.

Me: So, you’re on a comedy troupe, are there any rituals you guys like to do before shows?

Him: We like to make sure that we’re all connected, on the same page, and in a good, fun, mind-set so that we can do well in the show together and support each other. So we do a pre-show chant. We pick one person a school-year who is in charge of it and it’s their job to come up with a chant, on the spot, before every show, to match the specific rhythm that we always use for it. And it has to relate to the theme of our show that week.

Me: For example, if you’re doing a show about Shakespeare that week, the chant has to be Shakespeare themed and fit into the rhythm?

Him: Yes. Exactly.

Me: And they have to make it up on the spot?

Him: Yeah, they can’t plan it during the day.

Me: But what if they do?

Him: Well, we just kinda go by the honor code. And you can tell if they’ve pre-planned it. It’s not as good if they’ve thought about it in advance. You can just tell. So, yeah, they make up a 3-line chant on the spot that can fit in the rhythm we always use and our show theme.

Me: How do you perform it?

Him: We all crouch down in a circle with one hand in the middle, and first, only whisper the chant. Then we keep repeating it, and repeating it, slowly getting louder and louder, until we’re jumping up like crazy people and screaming the chant at the top of our lungs, and we kind of all decide together when it’s going to end. It’s spontaneous. We just feel it out and it’s great. Super fun. Gets us super amped before the show.

Me: How long have you been doing this as a troupe?

Him: It’s been passed down for like 6 years now, since spring of 2008 when the troupe got started. And depending on the person whose job it is to create the chant, it’s been different every year.

Me: How so?

Him: So, last year my friend A***** was the pre-show chant guy, and his chants were always witty and had a twist at the end. This year I have another friend doing it and hers are really good at tying themes in, and they tend to be cute little diddies. My friend E*** did it my first year on the troupe and he always managed to use the word “queef” in all of his chants.

Analysis:

I think this practice is similar to many other rituals in theatre and performance arts in general. There seems to be a definite concentration on achieving a specific mindset in order to be successful onstage, where unity of the performers is the ultimate goal. I think the significance of improvising the chant on the spot emphasizes the importance of the present moment, which is a large part of many acting/performance curriculums. Being in the present in the current moment. Improvising and “jumping up like crazy people” also seem to become liberating tasks that allows the actors to let go of embarrassment and self-consciousness, and therefore could possibly quell any levels of stage fright.