Tag Archives: Rituals

Jumping Three Times at Midnight on New Years

Nationality: Filipino American
Age: 20
Occupation: Cal Poly Pomona student
Residence: Burbank, CA
Performance Date: 4/25/20
Primary Language: English

Piece

AM: If you jump three times at midnight [on New Years] you’ll get taller. That’s what my grandparents tell me when I was little. 

Interviewer: Did you do it?

AM: Yeah, but did I get taller. No! I’m 5’2 still. It was just on New Years when it hits 12:00am.

Interviewer: Is this a cultural thing?

AM: Um, I think it is because that is what a lot of like old Filipinos would say when I was little 

Context

AM is a childhood friend of mine and we were having a causal chat on Facetime when I asked her if she had any folklore to share with the database. She is a 20 year old student at Cal Poly Pomona. Her family is from the Philippines, but she has lived in Southern California all her life. She comes from a Catholic household and went to a private catholic school for elementary and middle school.  

Analysis: 

Rituals done on New Year’s Day often represent our desires and hopes for the coming year. Midnight on New Years’s is the most liminal time of year where you might be able to break the natural rules and use that to your advantage and change something about yourself in a way that would not be possible any other time of the year. 

Also, three is a sacred number in Christianity, which is likely why it was chosen for the number of spins as many people in the Philippines and members of AM’s family are Catholic. The role of belief also plays a major part in the transmission of the custom. It was the older generation that enforced the practice and believed in it to a greater extent. AM was only following what was told to her by her grandparents. However, she did not continue the practice and will likely not encourage her children to take part in it as she does not believe in it.  

Indian Holiday of Karva Chauth

Nationality: Indian American
Age: 20
Occupation: Business student at USC
Residence: Southern California
Performance Date: 4/19/20
Primary Language: English
Language: Hindi

NA: Ok so there is this holiday called Karva Chauth and you have to fast for your husband’s long life all day until you see the moon and then you have to do this weird thing and nobody knows why you do this but like you take a flour sifter and you hold it up to the moon at the end of the day before you break your fast. Nobody knows why the hell you do this, but you have to hold it up to the moon. When you do that, you do it at night, and once you do that you can break the fast.

Interviewer: Okay, and who participates in this?

NA: So it’s is only women and it can be like women that are married, like I can do it for my future husband like I don’t even have to know him. It is just for the long life of my husband. My grandma did it, so my maternal grandma stopped doing it after her husband passed away and my other grandma when her husband passed away she did it for my dad, so she did it for her son. It’s just women and then some men will do it for my long life so I’ll fast with them, um but otherwise men don’t have to do it. They really don’t have to show up until the end of the night when you do that flour sifting thing.

Context

NA is a 20 year old USC buisness student whose family India. She grew up in southern California, but is very conencted with her Sindhi culture. She is also my roommate and I asked her about any folklore she had relating to her Indian background. This information was gathered from an informal interview conducted over Facetime. For further context related to this story she is a single woman who has never been married. 

Thoughts

This holiday emphasizes the importance of the woman’s role as a wife and mother in Indian culture. Although it is not unique to Indian culture, it shows the importance of the role of women while men do not have the same obligation as a husband to bless their wives in the same way. It also shows the power of rituals. NA and her family perform the ritual because they believe in its power. However, that does not mean they know exactly why the particulars of the rituals are there. Thus, showing the level of trust in what has been passed down through the generations and how that can be effective without knowing why. 

Additionally, this ritual shows the connection between femininity and the moon that is seen in many cultures around the world. It seems as though women are using their connection with the moon to bless their husbands, demonstrating the power of that connection. Fasting also is a common symbol of religious observance in the Hindu faith with many religious holidays involving a fast, and many Hindu’s fasting on particular days of the week to show reverence towards the corresponding god. 

Ghost Parties in Thailand

Nationality: Thai American
Age: 24
Occupation: Student
Residence: Long Beach
Performance Date: April 30 2020
Primary Language: English

Informant: So, like, my family is kinda, like, the official designated ghost family in my village. And my family is from this very small, um, place, kinda outside of Chiang Mai, like 30 minutes outside of Chiang Mai in Northern Thailand. Um. And so my mom, even though she was adopted– so she doesn’t have this official designation, but it’s my family, they basically take care of all the ghosts in the village. And the ghosts are like the ancestors of all of the families that live there and each generation, they have a special woman that they picked out, that’s like part of the bloodline, and.. it can’t be a man, it has to be a woman, and she’s like the keeper of the ghosts. Um, and so it used to be my grandma, and now it’s, um, its fallen to, like, one of my aunties, and now it’s with my cousin who– lemme tell you about my cousin, her name is {name}, and she has like a very severe, like.. learning disability.. So she’s the new keeper of the ghosts. And its, its, kind of interesting because, like, she can’t work, she can’t have a job, she can’t marry.. She’s very, very frail and very thin, but.. It’s kinda nice, cuz now she’s the one that has this responsibility. 

Collector: Right, right, she doesn’t need to… Does she makes money off this?

Informant: No, no, it’s not– it’s more of like a communal village position. But the village is like one big extended family. Y’know. And all of our ancestors are everyone else’s ancestors. And we have one little temple in the very center, y’know, we go to like, mass– it’s like Buddhist mass, basically, on Sundays. Um, so.. But anyways, every eight years there’s what we call like a ghost party. I missed the last couple cuz I was in school, um, but basically every eight years it’s like throwing a big party for all of the ghosts. Like, all of the ancestors, and you get, like, all the food gets spread out.. Spirits in Thai culture are very hungry.. They’re basically like, the ultimate hedonists, they just wanna consume everything. And so you give them, like, entire spreads of like chicken, and food, and like carnations, flowers, they love cigarettes, you get them a lot of cigarettes, they really like, um, whiskey, so you give them a lot of whiskey. Um, and it’s like, everyone gets drunk and gets together, and the process of getting drunk with your family members and your village, its like the spirits come, and they’re getting drunk, and they’re eating with you. 

Collector: This is all so interesting.. When, when you say taking care of the ghosts, you mean like giving them offerings, and keeping the altars clean? 

Informant: Yeah, so it’s kinda like that, it’s also kinda like, part of the spirit lore is like, they’re ghosts, so its like human ancestors, and another part of it is like, like, a lot of high-elf fantasy stuff, like, kind of speaks true to Thai culture, where like before the humans came, there were spirits in the forest. And these spirits are very old, and they had been there for like millennia. And they owned the forest, that’s their domain, and like, in Thailand, you know, we cut down the forest, we lived there and we farmed, and so we need to like, give back to the spirits. 

Context: The informant is a close friend of mine, and is a Thai-American young woman. She lived in Thailand for several years with her mother, before they both moved to Southern California.

Analysis: This is possibly my most exciting collection, seeing how I have a friend who has thrown a ghost party before. This experience is obviously personal to not only my informant, for also for the entire village. They do not differentiate their own ancestors from the village ancestors, which ties the entire village together, even after death. It is interesting that Thai spirits are considered to be hungry, as I have seen previous examples of hungry ghosts in Korea and Japan, all of which stem from Buddhism. I also find it interesting that only woman can serve the ghosts, as previously mentioned.

Dandelions

Nationality: American
Age: 29
Occupation: Vice Principal
Residence: Oakland
Performance Date: 4/10/20
Primary Language: English

Context: The informant is my older sister (LC) and the following text is transcribed from our phone conversation. She reflects on a good luck ritual she used to do with her friends that was taught to them by their parents.

Main Text (LC): “The belief or myth behind the meaning of the Dandelion is that if you make a wish and blow on one, and the seeds all go everywhere, your wish will come true. And I think that’s the myth everyone knows about them. But now, to me, they mean something else. They show up in this book about activism and social justice that I read and the book states that the dandelion is a metaphor for change. The book says that just like the dandelion, only one seed is necessary to spread great change, and I find this message very powerful.”

Analysis: The belief or ritual that blowing on a dandelion grants your wish has been commonplace in the United States for a long time. This practice reminds me of how a child blows out a birthday candle and makes a wish. I think it is interesting how the dandelion is used as a different metaphor in the book my sister read and demonstrates how an object’s symbolism can change over time and garner new meanings.

Witching Rods Gold Ritual

Nationality: American
Age: 50
Occupation: Independent Contractor
Residence: Chico, CA
Performance Date: April 23, 2020
Primary Language: English

Here is a transcription of my (CB) interview with my informant (HH).

CB: “Okay so what did your mom teach you?”

HH: “My grandma. It was….divining rods or witching rods? I can’t remember exactly. But they were two sticks tied together, and you’d bow ‘em and there was a certain way you’d hold them in your hand, and you’d walk around and when you were over gold they’d let you know”

CB: “Why do you think it was important?”

HH: “It saved a heck of a lot of time when we were looking for gold.”

CB: “What do they mean to you?”

HH: “It was a pretty cool experience when I was a kid. Because those rods knew what was happening. So you’d take a pan of gold and then you’d wave it over the pan a few times and you’d walk around and pretty soon they’d start pulling you down just like a fishing rod. And you’d know if you dug deep enough you’d find something. And my grandma lived on a great big gold claim, and so we’d go visit her and always go looking for gold”

CB: “Why do you think people kept using the rods instead of something like a metal detector?”

HH: “Well it’s just what they’d been doing since before metal detectors.”

Background:
My informant and all of his family grew up in northern California which has a rich history associated with the Goldrush. The area where he lives is just an hour from where gold was first discovered. Many of the families and towns in the area can trace their history directly back to the Goldrush. While it is no longer a profitable career, gold can still be found if dug in the hills or panned for in the creeks. Many still actively search for gold as a hobby. The gold plot that my informant described can be traced through family back to the Goldrush. Growing up, his parents and grandparents often sent him and the other kids searching for gold as a way to keep them entertained. Witching rods are typically associated with finding water to dig wells, however the old gold miners were known to use them to find gold as well.

Context:

I interviewed my informant in person, at home, as we sat on the couch and discussed local history. The conversation was easy and comfortable. 

Thoughts:

While gold digging and panning are still somewhat common in our community, witching rods have been phased out, and are very heavily associated with ‘hillbilly superstitions’. I thought it was very interesting that my informant believed so strongly in the rods, when they had been largely discredited socially. I think this belief is rooted in the idea of tradition, and trusting the generations before you. He cited the continuation of using the rods as being accredited to the fact that it was tradition. It’s this idea that many people have successfully used the same tool as you that gives the practice a sense of truth beyond the science of a metal detector. Like many other families in the area, my informant’s family no longer owns the gold plot, or engages in gold mining of any sort. He has become a passive bearer, and I believe that this tradition won’t be practiced for much longer.

For another variation of Witching Rods see YouTube video “Beginners guide to dowsing” uploaded by gardansolyn. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bbwo0YCpV3E