Tag Archives: grandmother

Health Proverb

AGE: 19 

Date of performance: 02/18/2025

Language: English

Nationality: American

Occupation: Student 

Primary Language: English

Title- ‘Eat one apple, 3 eggs, and 3 glasses a milk a day and you won’t have to see the doctor’ 

Context- J is a student studying Business & Econ. She tells me that whenever she talks to her grandmother, who resides in Shanghai, she always sends a text that translates to “Eat one apple, 3 eggs, and 3 glasses a milk a day and you won’t have to see the doctor” in order to make sure J stays healthy. 

Analysis- The phrase that J’s grandmother consistently tells her is a twist on the commonly known proverb “An apple a day keeps the doctor away’. However, J’s grandma has added her own advice to the phrase such as 3 eggs and 3 glasses of milk. The way that J’s grandmother, who lives on the opposite side of the globe, knows of the common proverb and decides to add her own twist to it is a prime example of how flexible and applicable pieces of folklore can be to apply to certain demographics and cultures. Specifically within East Asian culture, eggs and milk are seen as valuable sources of nutrition as they provide protein through easily attainable resources. 

The Nova Scotia Spirit

Nationality: American 

Age: 60 

Occupation: Writer 

Residence: Sherman Oaks, CA 

Performance Date: November 28, 2024

Primary Language: English

STORY: “I was in Nova Scotia staying at my parents’ house on a cove on the water, and my grandmother was very sick, and she was dying nearby at the hospital. And I’d been like two or three times, and it’s grueling. Everytime you leave it’s like you’re saying goodbye to someone for the last time; it’s hard. And she was very very sick. And so, I believe my mother was at the hospital, and I was standing on the dock, overlooking the cove, watching, like, dolphins and whales swim by, and I saw coming down from the sky, this…entity, like, almost like, with like…gossamer, flowing fabric behind it. Came tight down right in front of me, down into the water, up, around me, and then went away. And I was like ‘what the actual?’ And then my mother called and said that her mother just died. So I’m guessing maybe she was…saying goodbye.”

ANALYSIS: Seeing as this happened before the individual knew of her grandmother’s passing, it is less likely that the entity she witnessed was merely a manifestation of her grief, or a way to cope with her grandmother passing away. While it could’ve been subconscious, it is still unlikely. It is interesting, however, that the spirit described in this story with “gossamer, flowing fabric” that came from the sky, is eerily similar to a lot of modern Western visual interpretations of ghosts. It was not a corporal entity, nor one that resembled an animal, but a very traditional “ghost” of sorts. Nonetheless, it could be plausible that it was the ghost or the spirit or the soul of the individual’s grandmother saying goodbye one last time.

Visited By a Passed Relative

Nationality: American
Age: 23
Occupation: Actor
Residence: Los Angeles
Performance Date: March 25th
Primary Language: English

Context :

JH is 23 years old and from San Francisco, CA. They are a USC graduate I met a few months ago. They lived in San Francisco for a majority of their life before moving to Los Angeles for school. They consider themselves very superstitious. Growing up, they were really close with their grandmother, and it was very hard on them when she passed away.

Text :

“I meditate a lot, and I think that there have been times in my meditation experience—especially when I was dealing with grief, like the loss of my grandma and such—that I felt like a presence was there. And I remember, I was like on a family vacation and I was like sitting in the living room having a horrible day in this like rental house and I was meditating and I was really grieving my grandma because it was only a couple months earlier. Then, all of the sudden, I literally felt like two hands on my shoulders. At first, I thought it might have been creepy, but I didn’t feel a creepy presence, I felt a comforting presence. It felt like my grandma was reminding me that she was there.”

Analysis :

When people hear the phrase ghost stories, they immediately associate that with bad thoughts or bad omens. But that isn’t always the case. For example, as seen with my informant, encounters with the divine can actually be a good thing, and a sign that it is okay. Lots of ghost stories have to do with these supernatural beings keeping people out of what they consider their homes, but for JH, their grandma is keeping her close. On a deeper level, this is a way that people can justify the emotions their having or find closure. Since JH was so close with their grandma, believing they encountered her after she passed away and was reminded of her presence goes to show how affirming ghost stories can be. Looking at ghost stories through that lens can give us a different perspective on how they are being interrupted, and stray away from painting ghosts in such a negative light.

Baba Marta

Main Text

CS: “So the next one I was thinking of was the tradition of Baba Marta, which is like the first day of spring for Bulgarians. It’s like the first of March and you hang up these white and red like crochet, or like knitted things, like yarn and they sometimes look like people, sometimes they’re just abstract shapes. I don’t really remember what the shape is. But people always wish each other ‘Chestita Baba Marta’ or like happy first day of spring and Baba Marta is like baba of spring. I guess somewhat similar to the Baba Yaga story, there’s this grandma who is the incarnation of spring and shes just like a joyous type I guess.”

Background

CS is a 21 year old Bulgarian American from California and is a third year student studying Computer Science: Games at USC. CS describes the Baba Marta holiday like Christmas, you do not remember your first one but it is an ever-present time in your life. CS loved Baba Marta as a holiday because he could look forward to seeing his family and having an excuse to eat. His father, aunt, and grandmother all celebrate it with him every year.

Context

Baba Marta is a spring time festival celebrated in Bulgaria on March 1st. Confusingly it is also the name of a physical embodiment of springtime that comes to people as a joyous old woman.

Interviewer Analysis

Festivals celebrating the end of winter and the coming of a sweeter season are a very common phenomenon especially in eastern European countries with Slavic influences, even though Bulgaria’s geographical placement further south in Europe means that its winters would not have been as harsh as say countries like Lithuania. Lithuania’s Užgavėnės festival however is a very similar celebration, in that it celebrates the end of winter and the beginning of a more fertile season.

Pennies from Heaven

Context: Pennies are a form of American currency equaling 1 cent. Their low value makes them adaptable since people are generally not worried about conserving them. because of this, pennies have also become a common object of folklore-ish discussion.

Background Information: Informant’s grandmother died young, and the informant’s mother and father died when informant was in their twenties. Informant and Informants family are/were Christian and very relationally close to one another. The loss of their family has been very difficult for informant.

Informant: “My mother used to tell me that when my grandmother- her mother- died, that she would send pennies to her as kisses from heaven. Whenever we saw a penny on the side of the street, she would tell me grandma had sent it. When my own mom died, I went to the funeral, and I had paid a parking meter. When I came back to my car, the meter had broken and all these pennies littered the ground. I just bawled and bawled and bawled. Completely broke down crying.”

Thoughts: The presence of pennies is common folklore, and is often perceived as a sign of some sort when found accidentally. Whether or not the parking meter was a coincidence or not, the folklore surrounding the penny stands firm. The penny in this situation connects a member of a family group to the other members, even after death. The folklore is a unifying front, which unifies the member of this group and gives credence to the belief that the members of the group will continue to embody their group identity even after death.