Category Archives: Customs

Customs, conventions, and traditions of a group

Lanzones

Nationality: Filipino
Age: 35
Occupation: Retail Branch Manager
Residence: Yucaipa, CA
Primary Language: English
Language: Tagalog

Steven “Ricky” Phillips was the son of a military family.  They moved around from base to base quite a bit.  He lived in the Philippines for a number of years before moving to The United States of America.  His father was in the Air Force and met his mother in the Philippines while stationed at the Clark Air Base.  Ricky currently resides in Yucaipa, CA with his wife and two daughters.  He is a Branch Manager for JP Morgan Chase Bank, N.A.

I also remember a story my mother had told me about a fruit that she and I used to pick on the air base called Lanzones.  As we picked and ate the fruit, she taught be to pinch the fruit by the stem to open and peel the fruit.  She told me the story of how this began and why it continues as the process of eating this particular fruit.

A village in the Philippines not believed this fruit to be poisonous, but the beauty of the fruit often caused doubt to its poisonous nature.   The temptation would cause villagers to venture and try it despite the risks.  An old woman visited this village.  She needed food, water and shelter.  This village was helpful and let her stay as long as she needed and provided food and water.  The villagers had told her about the poisonous fruit.  She asked to see it, and when they showed it to her, she taught them how to pinch the fruit at the stem to render the fruit harmless and edible.  She proved it by eating one after another.  Ever since, the method of pinching and peeling this fruit has continued, and the story passed on along with it.

Dear Heavenly Father …

Nationality: African American
Age: 26
Occupation: Teacher
Residence: San Bernardino, CA
Primary Language: English

Shirley Turner Jean grew up in Rialto, California.  She graduated from Dwight D Eisenhower high school I 2004.  From there, she pursued a bachelor’s degree in physical education at Cal State San Bernardino.  Shortly thereafter, Shirley obtained a Masters Degree in Kinesiology from Azusa Pacific University.  She has sense obtained a number of credentials from Azusa Pacific University.  She currently lives in San Bernardino, California and teaches at Synergy Middle School in Los Angeles, California.  She is a PE teacher.

My husband and I pray together every night.  After we have finished our day and are getting ready for bed, we take a minute to hold hands and pray.  Our pastor always says that a couple that prays together, stays together so we try to make sure that we do this every night.  So, we get on our knees next to our bed, hold hands, and pray.  We thank God for all of the things that He has provided for us and our family and friends.  We thank him for blessing us and we ask that He continues to bless us.  If any of the people we know are travelling we ask for Travelling Grace for them and we ask for Him to intervene in the lives of anyone that needs His help. … I don’t know how else to explain it.  We just have a conversation with God.  After that, we lay down and sleep.

Easter in Texas

Nationality: American
Age: 19
Occupation: Student
Residence: Los Angeles, California (Originally from Houston, Texas)
Performance Date: 4/30/2013
Primary Language: English

Item:

“We have a ranch. It’s 30 acres, fairly big. I’d say if you walked all the way around it, on the fence, about three miles. Um and on this ranch we’ve got forest area, and then we’ve got these big fields, and every year, at Easter, my grandpa would take 1500 dollars, and he’d put them in eggs, and he’d invite everybody, depending on who was coming, he’d like, up the ante, you know, if a lot of friends of the family we’re coming he’d put down 2000, 2500 in these eggs. And the night before, you’re not allowed to watch him, you couldn’t even be there, he plants these eggs, in this field. Sometimes he’ll dig [pauses for emphasis] a foot deep. The trick is, they have to be like visible. Sometimes he’d plant them and then at night it would rain, and the eggs would sink to the bottom, get covered up by mud. The thing was, he’d always keep track of how many eggs there were, he made a map, of where all the eggs were so if anybody didn’t find them he wouldn’t waste any money. Now, it was getting to the point where he’d put money into the eggs at the beginning, and people weren’t finding all of the eggs. But, he started to just place all the eggs out there, empty, and mark them with either like a 0, an x, a triangle, you know, like a square, and each one of those corresponded to a certain amount of money. And you’d collect all your eggs, these empty shells and you’d give it to him you’d hand them in and he’d pay you that amount of cash. And of course there was a brunch. It started at eleven o’clock [pause] but there was a brunch, and a dinner. Anyway the brunch, the kids ten and under got to go in first, get a five minute head start.”

Context:

The informant, who went to high school with me, regarding his family’s Easter tradition, stated: “it was just a family gathering and we did that every single year until my grandpa died this year, so uh we don’t do it anymore, but we did it every year since I could remember. I think, I think even like decades before that, you know. And it’d be a time, where the whole family got together and told stories from over the years because people would come from all over, come from Alabama, we had people from Kentucky come, things like that. We would have all of our family come in, and one year, people from Phoenix came in, and Barstow, which is just down the road. So we’d tell stories, get to catch up.”

Analysis:

The enthusiasm with which the informant told this story indicates how important this Easter tradition is to him. That the tradition died along with the death of his grandfather demonstrates the great extent to which the grandfather was revered in the informant’s family. The importance placed on this game of egg hiding and the lengths he would go to make this game a success reveal a lot about the character of the informant’s grandfather, mainly that he was a sporting man that was invested in devising the best possible egg hunt, but also a wise man, one who would thoroughly plan his endeavors.

 

Valentine’s Day and White Day in South Korea

Nationality: American (ethnicity: Korean)
Age: 19
Occupation: Student
Residence: Los Angeles, California (Originally from San Jose, California)
Performance Date: 5/1/13
Primary Language: English
Language: Korean

Item:

“Um, in Korea, they observe like different ways of celebrating like Valentine’s Day, in comparison to like Western cultures. Uh in Korea uh on Valentine’s Day, on February 14, instead of the guys getting something for the girls, it’s girls getting something for the guys. It’s usually like homemade chocolates, um like homemade baked goods, just like all this stuff. And then, a month later, on March 14, it’s called White Day where the guys kind of give back to the girls. There’s a saying I think where they give back three times as much, but what they do is the usually give also chocolate, marshmallows, and if it’s like couples they give each other like lingerie, all this other stuff.”

Context:

White Day is celebrated not only in South Korea, but also in Japan, Taiwan, and China.

Analysis:

That the men have to three times as much to the girls on White Day than they receive from them on Valentine’s Day points to the holiday’s purpose as a celebration of human relationships, and what inevitably ensues from them. The spring date of the festival reflects the associations of this particular season, mainly, fertility. In giving three times more than they receive, the males are attempting to find a partner, ultimately to fulfill the unconscious goal of reproduction.

An Indian Wedding Tradition

Nationality: American (ethnicity: Indian)
Age: 19
Occupation: Student
Residence: Los Angeles, California (Originally from Irvine, California)
Performance Date: 4/29/2013
Primary Language: English
Language: Hindi

Item:

“So my family originates from um, a little state called Gujrat in India, and uh we, our weddings in India differentiate from state to state, so our weddings have a certain aspect: At the beginning, prior to the formal ceremony, where the bride’s side attempts to steal the groom’s shoes. And it’s this big thing where both sides kind of get in this mini tussle that can kind of sometimes, expand in to big fights, um, over the shoes. And if the bride’s side succeeds in securing the groom’s shoes the groom then uh has to pay off the bride’s side to get his shoes back because he can’t leave , he can’t leave the uh location without those shoes.”

Context:

The informant on his experience with this wedding tradition: “So, um, this past wedding that I went to, I was on the groom’s side, so I was semi-in charge of my cousin’s, so we were in charge of securing those shoes and keeping them safe, so the entire way up until, the mundup is what we call it, it’s where they have the actual ceremony, we surrounded the groom like body guards and literally just walked him all the way up the stage and didn’t let anyone near him, like he was the president, um and successfully got him there without having the shoes stolen. In another situation at another wedding I was on the bride’s side, and um the groom’s side had secured one shoe, the other shoe had been secured by us, and one of the big guys like, put it behind him and held it there. And you know, I was in charge at the time of like figuring out where they took it, so I realized he had put it behind him and just had it in one hand, and I just grabbed it and ran, straight out of his hand, and got it that way. So I mean it takes a little scheming and planning, but it’s fun, it’s one of the fun parts about a wedding.”

Analysis:

Indian society is very patriarchal. So, in a way, what happens in a wedding is that the groom’s family steals the bride from her family. In this sense, the activity of the bride’s family in the wedding demonstrates their acknowledgment of this fact and their consequent response. That they steal the groom’s shoes exhibits a lighthearted form of revenge taken against the groom’s family. The monetary compensation received from the return of the shoes is the least they can expect after having their daughter stolen from them.