Tag Archives: Burma

Burmese Water Festival

TEXT:

This is a tradition that I have some experience with and that my aunt told me more about. When I was little, every April we would go to our local Burmese temple to celebrate Burmese New Year. After sitting through Buddhist religious services, us children would be handed little squirt guns. We were encouraged to go outside and shoot each other with water. There were often blow-up water slides and sprinklers outside, too. It was a lot of fun, so I never questioned what the meaning of all the water was. We called it the “water festival”, and I learned from my aunt that getting sprayed with water symbolizes a cleansing of the year’s sins and a clean slate for the year to come. She told me that in Burma the celebration is much more involved. Burmese people get inside open vehicles, like Jeeps or pickup trucks and form a parade. Each car passes by small stages where dancers perform in Burmese style. My aunt remembers them dancing to a song specifically relevant to the water festival. Other people on the small stage are tasked with throwing water at the passing parade of open vehicles so that everyone on them can be cleansed. 

CONTEXT:

My aunt noted that this was a tradition that Thai people also do, creating a sort of cultural bond between the two countries. She acknowledged that a lot of Southeast Asian countries share common cultural elements. 

My aunt also said that in Burma, teenage relationships were frowned upon. Dating wasn’t really a thing for her and her siblings growing up. The expectation was that they’d eventually bring someone to their parents and ask if they could marry. It wasn’t about the child’s romantic feelings as much as it was about the parents’ feelings. This relationship was subverted when the whole family came to the U.S., but that’s a different story. 

The reason I bring this up is because, strangely enough, the water festival marked one of the only times when flirtatious behavior was not only allowed, but even encouraged. Older children would chase their crushes around with water guns, trying to get water on each other. For children in general, the festival is more about having fun than it is about cleansing the past year religiously. 

My aunt acknowledged that in her generation she only remembers going to one official wedding. Everyone else eloped to marry someone their parents didn’t approve of. My aunt said a lot of them went to Shan state, a part of Burma that is known for its natural beauty.

ANALYSIS:


The water festival once again displays the ideals of community and neighborhoods in Burmese culture. Most holidays or events revolve around large groups of people that aren’t all blood related. It also displays the inseparable integration of the Buddhist religion into culture, but asserts that religion is more important the older you are. The water festival contains Buddhist services and food offerings are always brought to the monks who lead them, establishing respect for them as well as restating their central purpose to Burmese society as religious guides. Finally, my aunt’s generation of the family is very interesting because they seem to subvert lots of the traditional Burmese expectations for marriage and family. A few of my aunts and uncles aren’t Burmese at all (including my dad) – something that might be frowned upon back in Burma. However, they all had official, parent-supported weddings. I do know that my grandparents didn’t exactly follow their parents’ wishes and eloped, so they might be part of the transition to more romantically-motivated marriage too.

Burmese Marriage Ties

TEXT:

I talked to my aunt about some Burmese folk traditions and superstitions and she told me it’s bad luck to gift knives or scissors to a married couple. If you do, you’ve ensured their separation (so I guess it’s a last resort if your crush is taken). This is related to the symbolic tying of a couple’s hands together with cloth at Burmese weddings. The bind signifies that it is their duty to love and protect one another – that they are a team now and forever. But, you may ask, what about that amazing set of knives you never use that you just KNOW your newlywed best friend needs? In that case, they can buy it off of you, for whatever price you agree upon. It could even be a quarter, as long as it’s received as a transaction and not as a gift.

CONTEXT:

My aunt and my extended family abide by this tradition. My aunt remembered someone exchanging a quarter for some knives once, but it doesn’t really come up that often. It’s avoided because it’s easy to avoid – better safe than sorry. I don’t think anyone in my extended family would be horrified if someone gifted a sharp object by accident. They might be a little nervous, thinking “well what if it’s true?”, but not horrified. My aunt’s grandparents might have been, however. 

ANALYSIS:

I definitely didn’t know about this superstition because I don’t think I’ve ever really been responsible for crafting a wedding gift. I think this superstition signifies how important marriage is in Burmese culture. What’s equally as important is family image, because in Burma, that somewhat determines who your friends are and how successful you are economically. Having a marriage end in divorce (which is currently legal in Burma) brings shame to the families of the former couple. This is because it’s the parents who give approval regarding who to marry. It isn’t exactly arranged marriage, but parents always have the final say. If you get divorced it looks bad for them because they were the ones who deemed your spouse right for you. 

Htamane Puay – Burmese Glutinous Rice Festival

TEXT:

Every year, in February, small neighborhoods will gather and participate in “Htamane Puay”, or the Glutinous Rice Festival. Traditionally, the women of the neighborhood will prepare large quantities of sticky rice ingredients (rice, nuts, coconuts, seeds, etc.) and throw them into an enormous pot. Then, it is the men of the neighborhood who must be constantly stirring the pot so that the rice doesn’t stick or burn. They use enormous paddles to do this because anything else wouldn’t be large enough. Many men gather around the same pot to continually stir at the same time. The rice is offered with prayer to Buddha at dawn and is distributed to everyone in the community throughout the day. It is all done in the spirit of prosperity to come while giving thanks to what they have.

CONTEXT:

My aunt told me about this event and participated in it when she was younger, along with the rest of my extended family. The “neighborhood” was an important unit of people to them, just one step larger than family. Much of their lives when they lived in Burma revolved around those that lived nearest to them. They took care of each other, ate together, went to school together, and played with each other in the streets. Festivals like these were moments to remind a community to appreciate each and every one of its members. Also, the pictures we googled seemed much smaller than how my aunt remembered it. She thinks the pots have grown smaller over time, possibly due to the diminishing importance of the “neighborhood”.

ANALYSIS:

There’s a lot going on here for a folklorist to analyze. Most obvious is how closely knit a community can be compared to communities in other parts of the world. They rely on each other in times of hardship and celebrate together in times of prosperity – they work as a team and have responsibility towards one another. Second, it’s clear that common religion plays an important role in the daily lives and traditions of the community. They give offerings to Buddha and he gives back. Finally, there’s the assumed gender roles in the community. Men are expected to do manual labor while women are expected to do the more general parts of cooking. Both are equally important and the food would not be ready without one or the other.

Never Eat Bananas Before Bed: Folk Medicine

Nationality: Burmese-American
Age: 19
Occupation: Student
Residence: Santa Monica
Performance Date: 4/25/19
Primary Language: English

Context: I met with the student in his dorm room at around noon. A few students were milling around the room, waiting until their afternoon classes began. I started to chat with the group, all of which are freshman at USC, and I realized it would be the perfect context to record. I began by asking the informant about “Punch Buggy,” a popular childhood game to play in the car. Next, I asked the informant if his parents had ever shared some strange medical advice with him during his childhood. He replied with, “Never eat bananas before bed.” Somewhat confused, I asked him to elaborate and recorded his response.

Transcription:

WD: What did your parents used to tell you about eating bananas before bed?

SN: They told me to never eat bananas before bed ‘cuz you’ll wake up with a cough. Now, because of that, I won’t eat bananas before I go to sleep.

WD: Hunh, interesting. Where are your parents from again?

SN: My dad is from Burma and my mom is from Madagascar.

WD: So they won’t eat them before going to bed either, I bet?

SN: Yeah, they never do, so now I don’t either I guess.

Informant: The informant is a 19 year old male student at the University of Southern California. He was raised in Santa Monica, California, and his father is Burmese and his mother is Madagascan. The informant attended Santa Monica High School before arriving to USC. His parents informed him of the folk medicine, and he chooses to not eat bananas before going to sleep as a result.

Analysis: This piece of folk medicine could be derived from either of the informant’s parents, but is most likely tied to his mother. The Madagascan people were some of the first to ever cultivate bananas, however, they are contemporarily considered inedible, due to their high amount of seeds. It is possible that, since the bananas were so tough to eat, that swallowing the seeds before sleeping could cause a sore throat, in turn leading to a cough in the morning. However, this has no scientific evidence. While, it’s true that congestion can be worsened by bananas for some people, the body is also more prone to infection at night. Since the body takes roughly 2-3 hours to digest a banana, one’s immune system is weakened further by eating a banana before sleeping. Yet, at the same time, bananas are quite useful in protecting and strengthening one’s immune system. Possibly, the cough had been developing slowly, and sleeping worsened the preexisting affliction. It seems that, although  there is no guarantee of whether or not this particular piece of folk medicine is accurate, bananas could be a cause for a morning cough.

Hungry Ghost (Preta) in Burma

Nationality: Burmese
Age: 17
Occupation: Student
Residence: Burma
Performance Date: 10 November 2011
Primary Language: English
Language: Burmese

My room mate, ThawZin, is from Burma. He is a Buddhist, and is very religious. This is the story he told me from his country.

 

ThawZin: “First, some background info! In Buddhism we have different classes for spirituality. There are the demigods at the top, followed by humans, animals, hungry ghosts, then devils. Hungry ghosts are what we call ‘preta’ (pronounced pale-tar). Pretas are people, who, when they were alive, were greedy and malicious. Their death is usually caused by a greedy act they brought upon themselves. You know… pretas are actually pitied by humans, because they have to face suffering, but they deserve it. It’s karma. They are invisible, but they can scare mortals. They like eating the gooey shit coming from meat and other things, haha! That is why, every time I go to the market with my mom, we always have to spit on the floor, so that they won’t follow us. Their appearance: they have big bellies, and small heads. The big bellies symbolize how greedy they are, you know… They want so much, but the little head, little face, little mouth, symbolize that they can’t get anything, can’t get shit, you know? Haha!

 

Anyway so the story… my mother told me this before. In Burma there’s this guy. He was fucking greedy during his life time. One day he was really hungry. He loved eating intestines, so he went to his wife and said, ‘Where the fuck is my food?!” But the wife didn’t have anything prepared. He was so angry, so he went to the barn and, you know, he cut the tongues of the cows there while they were still alive! I mean the cows were still alive, and he just cut them, and so they were bleeding and shit. The cows were like… mooing the whole night, haha!  And they died a slow, painful death. He went to his wife, threw the cow tongues down at the table and told her to cook them for him. So the wife did. As he was eating the cow tongues, suddenly his own tongue started to dissolve. You know, it dissolved all the way to his insides. But karma did not kill him yet, it made him suffer. The cow tongue just dissolved his insides for days, until he died. He died just like the cows… a slow, painful death. When he died, that is when he became a preta. Well, he was reborn as a preta.”

 

Me: “Where in Burma was this? I mean, is there a specific place where he haunts?”

 

ThawZin: “Oh yes! It is in the old first kingdom of Burma, in Bagan.

 

Me: “Do people avoid that place?”

 

ThawZin: “Oh not at all! Actually you know, when he died, his preta was located under the ground. And then one day farmers in Bagan found that one part of… you know, the ground, started becoming fleshy. And that’s when they figured out that there was a preta there. They don’t avoid it. They constantly plow over the land, again and again. The greedy guy has to suffer again and again, getting plowed, but they can’t do anything about him. It’s karma, man. He deserves what came to him, and he has to stay there until he has repaid his debt, his bad karma.”

 

ThawZin’s story shows a lot about the Burmese culture, especially about the strength of the people’s belief in Buddhism. For one, the whole idea of a preta ghost is based on Buddhist beliefs in spiritual hierarchy and rebirth. As well, he says that even though people pity these pretas, when the farmers found out that there was a preta under the ground, they still plowed over him, again and again, even if it made the preta suffer, because they believed in the Buddhist concept of karma: that people deserve what is coming to them, good or bad. In many ways, his story also comes as a story of morality, particularly for the idea that greed and blind rage are unwanted negatives that will get you in trouble, and will follow you even after you die, in your rebirth, or the afterlife.