Category Archives: Customs

Customs, conventions, and traditions of a group

Vegetarian Tuesday

Nationality: Indian
Age: 18
Occupation: Student
Residence: New Delhi
Performance Date: April 26, 2017
Primary Language: Hindi (urdu)
Language: English

“Indian families that eat non-vegetarian foods regularly change what they eat every Tuesday to eat only vegetarian foods in honor of the gods because if you eat meat on Tuesday it will bring bad luck.  My household followed this rule pretty strictly, and my mom still does, but because my dad got tired of it me and my siblings don’t really have to follow it anymore.”

ANALYSIS:

This is a great example of a ritual that many families follow because it is deeply rooted in religious tradition, but more and more families today choose not to follow for whatever reason.  This makes me wonder what the trend of families that follow this tradition looks like in terms of how many families stop practicing this tradition every year.

After a Cremation

Nationality: Indian
Age: 18
Occupation: Student
Residence: New Delhi
Performance Date: April 26, 2017
Primary Language: Hindi (urdu)
Language: English

“In India it’s a rule for anyone who follows the Hindu religion that if they attend a cremation, which is the burning of a dead body, they have to shower first thing when they get home because if they don’t it brings negative vibes into the house and brings misfortune basically.  This is actually a really strictly followed custom because even though my house is pretty liberal about these sorts of things we still follow it very strictly.”

ANALYSIS:

It’s interesting to see which customs in the Hindu religion are followed extremely strictly and which customs are followed relatively liberally and only upheld by the more orthodox families.  For example, while this custom is followed quite strictly, the custom of eating vegetarian on Tuesdays and the custom of married couples fasting on one day of the year are followed quite loosely.

No Hair on Foreheads

Nationality: Indian
Age: 18
Occupation: Student
Residence: New Delhi
Performance Date: April 26, 2017
Primary Language: Hindi (urdu)
Language: English

“It’s a common superstition in India, and it used to be taken especially serious in my house, that people shouldn’t keep their hair on their forehead, like it should be kept combed back because if your hair covers your forehead it will bring you illness in the future.  My mom used to make me do it but when I started growing out my hair and refusing to cut it she let me just go with it even though I knew it was bothering her.  It isn’t a hardcore religious superstition, but it is followed more strictly than a lot of other superstitions.”

ANALYSIS:

There seems to be a sliding scale when it comes to how seriously certain Hindu customs are taken, and I find it extremely fascinating which ones land where they land on the scale.  From and outsider’s perspective, it seems a little arbitrary which ones are taken seriously and which ones aren’t, but I’d be extremely interested to find out if there’s anything connecting which customs are taken seriously and which customs are treated a little less seriously.

Family Recipe

Nationality: American
Age: 18
Occupation: Student
Residence: New York
Performance Date: April 27, 2017
Primary Language: English

“My dad taught me this recipe, it’s not even an ethnic recipe, just a family recipe for this cool dipping sauce.  You combine paprika and garlic powder and a little water and then this other ingredient I’m forgetting, but it makes for this really good, kind of dry sauce that goes really well on a hamburger or something.  My dad said he picked it up from a diner he worked at, so I guess that means this recipe went from some unimportant condiment at a diner to a staple ingredient at all our family’s meals, which is pretty cool.  But I’m not sure he’s telling the truth about picking up the recipe from a diner, I feel like that doesn’t make enough sense for it to be true, because I’ve worked in restaurants before and no such recipe exchanging has happened around me, but nonetheless, now that sauce recipe is a staple of our family.”

ANALYSIS:

This origin story of a family recipe is super cool because it subverts two common tropes of family recipes: that they are long traditions passed down from the ancestors of the family, and that they are secrets.  Not only did this family recipe start in a diner that the father of the informant just happened to work at of all places, but the informant clearly has no regard for who hears the ingredients, and they are listed very clearly above.  Still, the recipe has quickly managed to become an important part of the family, so it makes me think that maybe this is the beginning of what will become a long family tradition with this family.

Chinese philosophy told by my grandfather

Nationality: Taiwanese
Age: 53
Occupation: Freelance Translator
Residence: Taiwan
Performance Date: 4/22/17
Primary Language: Chinese
Language: English

The informant talks about her grandfather teaching her a well-known philosophical passage and somewhat like an idiom

Informant: Then he would tell ma another story about being ambitious, or living out to your full capacity from Zhuangzi again. “If you are a bird, you should be the biggest bird in the sky, 大鵬鳥. They are so big that when they spread out their wings, the occupy half of the sky.” I would challenge him “It doesn’t make sense. Then there would be only 2 birds in the sky because 2 would cover the whole sky!” Then he would tell me that “If you are a fish, then you should be the biggest fish in the sea. The big one that’s called the whale.” I would tell him, “No, sorry grandpa, whale is not a fish, it is a mammal!”

But then when I went back to Penghu, where my grandpa lived for 10 years of his life since he came to Taiwan with his father when he was 11, I finally realized how come he was so strict and serious all the times. We got off the bus at the community center where they were offering the elderly a luncheon that day. All elders sat up straight listening to the head of the village talking, no one was walking around, no one was talking, they all sat up straight listening. Then we went to a small park. The decoration at the park was red lantern with 三字經, another didactic passage telling us how to behave well, to be loyal to your emperor and filial to you parents and stuff. They got a grant to refurbish a section of the village where no one lived there many more. They made ceramic plates on the house, again with all didactic passages like honor your words, work hard, don’t be lazy, be polite and kind to others…

Growing up in Taiwan, I knew the phrase 慎終追遠, which means to know your ancestors. I probably used it hundreds of time writing essays and stuff, but I never really felt what it meant. This is the sad part of the modern day education, we learn many things as a knowledge, the meaning of those words literally, but not really felt it. You would have to really spend the time to talk with, live with, go back to the environment he grew up, then you would really understand how and why he was the way he was. I thought I knew my grandfather, but I always hope he would not be so dead serious. But it only took me 10 minutes setting foot in the village he grew up with, then I understood why he was so serious, then I really understood the meaning of 慎終追遠.

 

This is a very important part of the chinese culture, displays of filial piety is incredibly deep-rooted in our culture and it is something that is taught to toddlers in the east still practiced today. This is something that is quite lacking in the west, except for Hispanic culture as I am told. That aside, growing up in America, I rarely see filial piety being practiced. After hearing this story it really is interesting that coming from a Taiwanese family as well, although my parents do not feel that I must be obligated to be filial to them unlike they have been taught all their lives, it is something that is very eye-opening to me.