Tag Archives: Taiwanese

Yusheng

Nationality: Malaysian and Taiwanese/Singaporean
Age: 22 and 21
Occupation: Student

Description: It is the tossing of fish salad done during the New Years. People would circle around with chopsticks in hand. Then they would throw the salad as high as they are able, the higher meaning better fortune for the next year and having your wishes come true. The fish is the most important part due to the pun of the Chinese word for fish sounding like the word for abundance.

Background: It is something commonly done within her household. I was able to observe this ritual when we did it with a group of friends.

Procedure:

The salad is prepared with sauces, assorted vegetables and most importantly fish. The dish will then be presented on a table where people would gather. Each participant will be equipped with a pair of chopsticks. When the ritual begins, each participant will toss the contents as high as they can while saying their wishes. The duration of the ritual varies. At the end, the salad is consumed like a normal meal.

My thoughts:

In terms of cuisine, the salad is delicious. While the tossing does tend to make a mess, the sense of community and energy it brings is well worth it. There are many elements of this tradition that I believe are very neat. One thing is the origin of the tradition. It is mainly practiced by people who are ethnically Chinese living in Singapore or Malaysian. Most of the wordplay originated from the Chinese language, the fish signifying abundance is well known to any one who is Chinese. This tradition creates a branching and unique identity that separates itself from the traditions of the mainland and Taiwan. Food is commonly seen as something that brings people together; sharing food is often a bonding experience especially with home made cuisine. The community aspect is especially true for those in Malaysia, where ethnically Chinese people are part of the minority.

Don’t Turn Around at Night

Nationality: Taiwanese/Singaporean
Age: 21
Occupation: Student

Description: There is a saying that you should not turn around when you are walking at night, if you do, it becomes easier for ghosts to attack you.

Background: The informant is told this by her parents.

Transcript:

BL: When you walk at night, you can’t turn your neck around. Because there are two lights on your shoulders and they scare the ghosts away. If you turn your neck around, the light disappears and then you would be unprotected. So the ghosts will come and get you. I honestly don’t believe it but I hear about it a lot.

Me: Where did you hear it from?

BL: My parents. I think it’s from Singapore. Singapore superstitions are weird.

My thoughts:

It’s scary enough to turn around at night without any superstitions but this thing multiplies upon that fear. Looking at many other folklore, ghosts are always most active at night. This is likely due to the fact that vision is limited and anyone can become very vulnerable or see things like ghosts that may or may not be real. Also, this tale might be a way for people to avoid trouble such as becoming a witness to illegal activity. Of course, I wouldn’t believe in something like this, but it will be hard to not think about it.

QingMing Festival

Nationality: Taiwanese/Singaporean
Age: 21
Occupation: Student

Description: It is a Taiwanese holiday where people would visit the graves of their ancestors and loved ones. 

Background: It was considered a national holiday in Taiwan, where she lived.

Transcript:

BL: So there is a holiday in Taiwan called QingMingJie or QingMing Festival, some people call it Tomb-Sweeping day. It’s when we go to family burial grounds and we clean and decorate the graves and stuff.

Me: And it’s something you do every year.

BL: Yeah, it’s to honor and remember our ancestors and family. People also put stuff in front of the graves too, like food and flowers. Some people would also say prayers to the dead people. Oh we also burn paper, like burning paper money, we write things that we want our ancestors to have in the afterlife and burn the paper.

Me: I think my family does something similar.

BL: Yeah, but I think it’s more recognized in Taiwan because China used to not allow it. Like the cultural revolution and all that stuff.

My thoughts:

As said previously, the holiday was banned in China during the cultural revolution. I have heard about the holiday and participated in a few occasions. But I think this is a strong point of identity for Taiwan because of the banning of the festival, it is for this reason that it is a national holiday in Taiwan while it is a simple tradition in the mainland. Of course, the celebration and honoring of one’s ancestors is something that is consistently prevalent in Chinese and General East Asian culture. The main reason being the celebration of legacy and the immortality of the lineage. Someone is alive as long their ideas are passed on.

Taiwanese Ghost Month

Nationality: Chinese-Taiwanese American
Age: 22
Occupation: Production Assistant
Residence: Los Angeles, CA
Performance Date: April 10th, 2019
Primary Language: English
Language: Chinese (Mandarin)

Informant:

E, a 22-year-old Chinese-Taiwanese female who was born and raised in Los Angeles. She is currently a senior at the University of Southern California.

Background info:

E’s first language was English, but because her parents were immigrants, she quickly learned Mandarin as well. Her parents are proud of their culture, and thus they often participated in many Taiwan and Chinese traditions, and believed many of the superstitions, as well. This is one of the superstitions E’s mother believed.

Context:

Late at night, a lot of weird conversations happen. Because E is on a project with me, we were working together at around 2:00am when we started discussing superstitions. When she knocked on wood, it brought this conversation up. The following is a transcript of the conversation I had with E. (I will be represented with a J.)

Main piece:

J: “Are there any other superstitions that you experienced growing up? With your family or friends? School, even?

E: “I’m not sure that this would count as a superstition, it’s more of a tradition centered around various superstitions… In Taiwan, there is this thing called Ghost Month. It’s in August, but basically there are just things you aren’t supposed to do during this month that could cause you to become haunted by a spirit.”

J: “What kind of things?”

E: “Well… For one, you aren’t supposed to have like… major life events during this month. Like if a child is born during this month, then it means that the child is cursed in some way. Or you aren’t supposed to get married or else ghosts will haunt you and try to break the marriage apart… Swimming and bathing are discouraged otherwise a ghost will try to drown you? Ghosts just don’t like people doing things during this month…”

J: “Do you know when this started? Or when your family started to avoid these things?”

E: “My brother was born in August, so clearly my parents didn’t care haha… But no, it’s mostly like my grandparents and other family still in Taiwan that observe this. My cousins, for example, have like… ghost-themed things in school to sort of like honor the dead. The only thing my dad warned us not to do was get married during August because he believes that’s why his sister got divorced… Otherwise, I think there are just too many things that are considered ‘unlucky’, or bad, during this time to take the tradition seriously.”

Thoughts:

There is a lot to break down with this tradition. It is filled with a multitude of superstitions, but they all sort of revolve around ghosts haunting you for doing things like whistling, swimming, etc. This is very reminiscent of Halloween in the United States; ghosts just roam around looking to haunt people. From E’s recount, it seemed to me like most of these “offenses” were just actions that some would consider unruly. Whistling can become annoying, swimming in places other than a pool could be frowned upon, flying commercially could be supporting corporations, etc. However, I was interested in the abstaining from major life events – specifically the example of her father believing his sister got divorced because she was married in August. A common thread in the folklore I have seen or experienced is that people use it to explain something bad happening. “Oh, it wasn’t that the two people were not meant to be together, it was just the ghosts messing with their marriage.” Or when bad things happen on Friday the 13th, people do not see them as logical events, they blame it all on bad luck.

How to get kids to finish their meal (Taiwanese)

Nationality: Taiwanese/American
Age: 20
Occupation: Student
Residence: Los Angeles, California
Performance Date: 04/23/18
Primary Language: English
Language: Mandarin Chinese

Background information:

My friend introduced me to a piece of folklore about how one can effectively get children to finish their meals. He is of Taiwanese descent, as he was born in San Francisco, California and both of his parents were born in Taipei, Taiwan. His family moved to California since before he was born and have assimilated into the American lifestyle but still stay very true to their Taiwanese roots.

 

Main piece:

My friend explained to me a saying that is often used in Taiwan to get children to finish their meals and not leave any food on the plate. The saying goes that if one wants a child to finish their meal and eat everything on the plate, they tell the child that if he or she does not finish their meal, they will marry someone with facial blemishes growing up. He said that his interpretation of this as a child was that he always thought of the remaining food pieces on his plate as signifying the multitude of blemishes that would be on the future spouse’s face when he grew up. Therefore, in order not to risk this, he would always quickly finish his food.

 

Personal thoughts:

I think that this piece of folklore is quite comical because there is no way that there could possibly be any correlation between finishing a plate of food and one’s future partner having acne. I enjoyed that this was a very different saying than what I was used to hearing in the culture that I am immersed in today, as it is refreshing to hear something that I have not heard before. I did find it a bit strange, however, that it would be considered a fear factor to have a partner with acne or facial blemishes because I do not think that this is what one should focus on when considering potential future partners.