Dear Marge…
As I write this, your grandfather is royally pissed at me (and most probably at your mother, too).
But before I get around to explaining that rather usual occurrence above, I would like to let you know that being half-Chinese, you get two New Years. Yep, count ’em. TWO. The first one is the one with a Catholic Mass, supposedly lots of food at midnight, a nominal degree of fireworks (which you should leave for others to handle while you watch the skies from afar), and the replacement of your wall calendars (if you’re using them, by the time you read this). That one is considered a rather more universal New Year and follows what is referred to as the Gregorian calendar. This happens every January First.
The other New Year has become semi-universal due to the fact that the fucking Chinese are everywhere (yes, you and me included, kiddo…). It’s called… What else? CHINESE NEW YEAR! This one’s got a lot of frills on it. There’s Dragon Dancing, Pasty Rice Cake Giving (a.k.a. “Tikoy”), and an obsession with things red, gold and round. This one is a little trickier to schedule since it requires what is called a “Chinese” calendar, or sometimes referred to a “lunar” calendar.
"...there has been some undeniable drifting between me and your grandfather for too long..."As a child, Chinese New Year usually meant that uncles, aunts, and grannies hand out little red envelopes containing a bit of money (a.k.a. “Ang-Pao” with “Ang” meaning red, and “Pao” meaning wrap, or pack). So as a child, Chinese New Year usually ended with me and the rest of the cousins with pockets bulging with red paper and moolah. But for most of my adult life, I usually neglect anticipating the second New Year above. Although there is an easy reminder in that your Great Grandmother was born on New Year’s Day according to the Chinese calendar. So that’s a cool two celebrations in one, supposedly. Until your grandfather and his siblings started having one petty quarrel after another (and I mean PETTY), then the whole Grand Golangco Get-Together started going downhill… Slowly turning first into some sad masquerade party, and currently little more than the sad echoing of two or three glasses clinking empty toasts amid stories of past family glory, and looking for other people’s misery to feel better about themselves.
In most Asian countries, Chinese New Year is a humongous deal. And usually means that in the two weeks revolving around Chinese New Year’s Day, expect to not have transactions with countries like Singapore, Taiwan, China (d-uh!), Indonesia, too (I think), and other similarly chinky eyed populaces.
But anyways, my point is that today I was in a bit of error. Your grandfather sounded very disappointed that we didn’t make a single iota of effort to see him today, which is a Sunday happening to be the eve of Chinese New Year. And instead chose to devote the entire day’s efforts on the next-door neighbor’s wedding, which was scheduled at 2pm. In retrospect, we should have at least taken him out to a brunch or something.
In my defense (and your mother’s), there has been some undeniable drifting between me and your grandfather for too long. And I grew up with him justifying many things with a simple statement that “He said so.” I never bought that for some reason. And while we don’t necessarily take the effort to avoid him, we honestly don’t do too much in making time to see him. But I suppose today was different. It IS Chinese New Year, after all.
In the future, as you grow older, we’ll be going through many different holidays and traditions that you may not readily understand. But please do ask. I promise I will take the time to explain things, how these traditions came about, what they mean, the stories behind them (sometimes they’re even amusing), and if it’s important to me and to our family, I would like to ask that you try and give it a get go.
To paraphrase a line from “The Curious Case of Benjamin Button,” “Life can only be understood backwards, but it must be lived forward…”
Catch you later, kiddo…
Love,
Dad
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