Category Archives: Folk Beliefs

Wedding Soup Noodles

AGE: 21

DATE OF PERFORMANCE: 4/19/25

LANGUAGE: English, Chinese

NATIONALITY: American, Taiwanese 

OCCUPATION: Student

PRIMARY LANGUAGE: English 

RESIDENCE: Los Angeles 

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Interviewer: What’s a tradition that you and your family have done during the holidays or certain celebrations? This can include holidays, birthdays, weddings, funerals, etc.

AC: “Weddings are huge in my family, so the day of the wedding there’s this thing called wedding soup noodles. It’s like sweet/sour soup and mushrooms and seafood in a thicker soup. Noodles are also thicker. Also the bride still wears white!”

Context

AC and her nuclear family are the only ones from the rest of their family that is currently in America. The rest of her family (her extended family basically) all still live and reside in Taiwan.

Interpretation

I had never really heard of wedding soup noodles before, so this was definitely really interesting to hear about another tradition in Asian culture. Although, I think if I was to ask my family there would probably be a lot of wedding traditions also in Korean culture. The wedding traditions I know of are more ritualistic and concerned with what you wear. But, after some quick research, noodle soup is also a thing in Korean wedding culture! A lot of traditions overlap across Asian cultures, so it makes sense that there also includes “wedding soup” in Korean weddings as well. I’m not sure if I’ve ever ate these wedding noodles since my family leans more on the Americanized side and I honestly cannot remember the last time I went to a wedding.

Kicking the Lamppost for Good Luck

Age: 58

1. Kicking the same lamppost going to and leaving from a football game at the Coliseum for good luck. 

2. This participant went to the University of Southern California and graduated in 1995. While at USC, the participant remembers the football game days very fondly, including all of the odd good luck rituals that students would perform in order to ensure a win over the visiting team. One such ritual that she remembers is how students would kick a lamppost while exiting campus (through the Exposition Blvd exit) and walking towards the Coliseum, and would have to kick the same one they initially kicked while walking back onto campus. The participant admitted that she didn’t really understand where or when this tradition came from, but she remembers all of her friends – and the students around them – would go out of their way to kick the lampposts for good luck at the game. She admitted that she thought it was hilarious that students at USC today continued the tradition – probably with the same lack of knowledge of the traditions’ origins.

3. Interviewer’s Interpretation: While I myself also do not know specifically where this game-day tradition originated, I can attest to the fact that USC students (myself included) still participate in the ritual to this very day. It could be possible that – much like the idea of a lucky shirt or some other lucky totem/item – one student or a group of students just so happened to kick the lamppost one day on their way to the game, and after winning that game, believed that they had to maintain the exact same routine they went through that day to ensure that they would continue to win games at the Coliseum. Since USC is a school with such a large football culture, it is no surprise that this game-day tradition would therefore spread amongst the students who wanted more than nothing to crush their opponents and uphold their school image through their sense of school spirit.  

Snake Skin on a Fence Brings Rain

Age: 21

1. Text: In Texas, there is the folk belief/ritual that if one puts snake skin on their fence, rain is likely to come. 

2. Context: This participant, born and raised in Texas, spoke of a superstitious ritual that he believes is pretty unique to Texas. He says that growing up, whenever he would visit some of the more rural – or even suburban – areas of the state (he himself had grown up in more of an urban area), he would sometimes see fences lined with snakeskin. When he asked his parents about it after seeing it a couple of times – too often for it to just be an odd decoration or coincidence, he explained – his parents just told him it was an old superstition that the snake skin would bring rain. He never really understood why this would be a belief, and explained that his best interpretation or understanding of the odd ritual was that maybe it was an old Native American tradition or something akin to an old superstition left over from a bygone era.   

3. Interviewer’s Interpretation: Upon initially hearing about this folk belief and ritual from my interviewee, I was similarly confused by the superstition. While I don’t fully know whether or not this is necessarily a ritual from any particular Native American tribe or belief system, I don’t doubt that it could have roots in some type of rain-related ritual, as rain rituals appear throughout countless cultures. Perhaps this superstition is meant to evoke a sort of causality through the fact that snakes might become more visibly present during rainy seasons/storms; it seems plausible that people believed that if rain causes snakes to appear more often, maybe this cycle can be triggered through the use of their skins. Just like how earthworms seem to pop up in abundance after a particularly rainy day, maybe snakes too appear more frequently – and maybe through this, people began to believe if they brought out snakes/snake skins they could evoke this pattern and it would begin to rain. 

White Sage Tea

Age: 21

1. If you have a cold you should drink white sage tea.

2. This participant, born and raised in San Diego, recounted the fact that while she was growing up, her family was very much into holistic medicine and would often give her and her siblings various teas and “natural remedies” for any sickness. One specific medicine she remembers was white sage tea. Whenever she had a cold or a cough or just generally complained about feeling ill, her parents would give her a hot cup of white sage tea to make her feel better. She very distinctly remembers the flavor – she said it tasted incredibly “herb-y” and “earthy” and that she used to complain about the taste until her parents would agree to at least add honey or some type of sweetener to appease her. While growing up, the participant states that she never really thought about the origins of this treatment and simply thought it was normal. Now grown up, however, she has since learned that the treatment is rooted in local customs and traditions of the Kumeyaay – a tribe that has historically inhabited the San Diego area. Although she stated she never actually asked her parents why or how they came across the remedy, she assumes it’s just through the fact that they had always been tapped into holistic remedies, they probably just encountered the remedy through the local community.

3. Interviewer’s Interpretation: Natural remedies or holistic medicine is something that has existed for generations, outdating modern medicine by centuries. This specific interview reveals how localized these practices often are. I myself also have parents who are fairly tapped into the world of holistic medicine, and yet despite this – having not grown up in San Diego – I was completely unaware of white sage tea as a remedy. Although this is a fuzzier distinction to make in the age of technology and globalization, since holistic medicine is not necessarily a mainstream practice, I would argue that it still relies on one’s local environment and historical communities on its upkeep and continued practice.

Twelve Grapes, Twelve Wishes: A Central American New Year’s Ritual

Nationality: American
Age: 31
Occupation: Student
Residence: Los Angeles, California

Informant Information

Age: 31

Date of Performance: 04/18/2025

Language: English

Nationality: American

Occupation: Student

Primary Language: English

Residence: Los Angeles, California

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“It’s basically just a New Year’s tradition that, growing up, my mom always did. I thought it was just something unique to my family, but later I realized that a lot of families actually do it, especially Central American ones. My parents are Salvadoran, but I also know Guatemalan and Mexican families that do this too. So basically, for New Year’s Eve going into New Year’s Day, you get 12 grapes, and you eat them right at midnight, at 12:00 AM. Each grape represents a wish for the new year. It’s one wish for each month, 12 months, 12 grapes. Every year we do it, hoping those wishes come true.”

Context

The informant first learned this tradition from her mother when she was around 7 years old, which was around the time she learned to write. Her mother included a writing element in the ritual, having her write each wish down on a piece of paper as she ate each grape. This additional step not only reinforced the intention behind each wish but also allowed her to reflect on her aspirations later in the year and see whether they had come true. Writing the wishes gave the ritual a deeper sense of meaning and permanence. The informant originally believed the ritual was exclusive to her household, but she later discovered it was a widespread cultural practice shared by many Central American communities.

Analysis

The practice of eating 12 grapes at the stroke of midnight is a well-known New Year’s ritual in many Latinx communities, rooted in Spanish and Latin American cultural traditions. In the informant’s experience, the ritual serves as a bridge between personal belief and cultural heritage. What began as a family custom reveals itself to be part of a larger collective identity that transcends borders.

Her family’s unique addition of writing down the wishes transforms the ritual into both an oral and written tradition. This adaptation highlights how folklore evolves over time and reflects the values and practices of individual families within broader cultural norms. Writing down the wishes adds an intentional, reflective dimension to the practice, reinforcing ideas of goal setting and emotional renewal. The ritual embodies hope, aspiration, and the human desire for a better future, encapsulated in a symbolic and communal act.