so i have just gotten back after an extended stay at my parents’ place for tet. for those of you who don’t know, tet is the vietnamese term for the lunar new year. days were filled going to buddhist temples, burning incense, visiting family, handing out red envelopes, receiving red envelopes, eating vegetarian food, “visiting” ancestors at cemetaries…
as i have gotten older, a lot of these rituals have fallen into my vague memory, even more so that these rituals are predicated on a whole world view and set of beliefs that have become increasingly foreign to me they are mediated by my family and i no longer live with them. it’s hard to describe, but i think that all children experience this kind of initial jolt when we return to out parents place: slipping back into the role that we once occupied –both familiar and slightly discomforting–, that familiar meter of conversation, certain smells, etc. but for me it’s especially jarring only because it’s founded on a whole worldview that i understand less and less as i get older.
as a child of immigrant parents, there are things that i simply just don’t bother mentioning to them as i know they just couldn’t undestand. not that are stupid, but it’s just completely off their radar. case in point, as much as i have tried to explain to them that ryan is taking off work for six months and hiking the applachian trail, they still don’t understand what that means. the don’t comprehend at all the notion of willingly NOT working, let along walking in the woods by yourself for an extended period of time. this is
my first tet with my family in ten years and i still don’t quite get why i have to bow three times and kneel at the altar with one buddha, but then only bow once at the altar of my ancestors. i still don’t quite get why we bless coffee at the altar for my grandfather. i don’t understand exactly what they’re saying when they’re doing their buddhist chants. i don’t get much of it. but i just do them now anyway.
Filed under: california
sheesh! since when did LA get so expensive? now, when i was living in southern california about 10 years, i was under the impression that the overall cost of living down there was much cheaper than in the bay area. what’s happend to LA? how has it grown so much? i mean, there is an abundance of land, relative to the bay, but it baffles me that supply and demand for housing is really so that it can really support that many people with those kinds of prices. i’ve been trolling craigslist for awhile now and it seems as if LA is just about as expensive as San Francisco. since i’ve been living in the east bay for so long, this is quite shocking to me. how the hell am i gonna afford something comfortable on a student’s income? ugh.
