chinese new year visitations
Amusing things always take plce when you go visit relatives who don't even know you exist.
It starts with the usual "wah, so tall!", and "how old are you ah?". And this is taking for granted that they speak English. My great-grandmother, for instance, only speaks multiple dialects and Malay. Every year, she berates me for not speaking Malay in Malay, and every year she grows more and more senile. She's about 90, and has the short term memory of a goldfish. The funniest part came when she asked the 3 of us what CCAs we took. My brother and sister were easy to explain, because chess and gymnastics translates easily. When my dad tried to tell her I was in debate, she thought I was a 25 year old lawyer...and she asked us the same question 6 times. I counted.
Visiting today was tiring, because on my mother's side, I have a total of 12 living grand aunts/uncles. They have ALREADY started asking me whether I have a boyfriend. I was stunned, because I thought they only ask you that when you're 35 and still collecting ang paos. But I suppose their going by the pre-Industrial Revoltution biological clock, where you married by 11, had 9 kids at 13, went senile at 15, then on your 16th birthday got sealed into a wooden box. You could see both my parents tense up and lean foward, then deflate with relief when I said no, I don't have a boyfriend. Next year, I'll say that his name is Tan Ah Beng, he has 88 piercings on various parts of his body, drives a lorry, has body odour, and is 42 years old.
Tomorrow we're going to see post-Jurassic era peopl, mostly my mom's colleagues etc.
It starts with the usual "wah, so tall!", and "how old are you ah?". And this is taking for granted that they speak English. My great-grandmother, for instance, only speaks multiple dialects and Malay. Every year, she berates me for not speaking Malay in Malay, and every year she grows more and more senile. She's about 90, and has the short term memory of a goldfish. The funniest part came when she asked the 3 of us what CCAs we took. My brother and sister were easy to explain, because chess and gymnastics translates easily. When my dad tried to tell her I was in debate, she thought I was a 25 year old lawyer...and she asked us the same question 6 times. I counted.
Visiting today was tiring, because on my mother's side, I have a total of 12 living grand aunts/uncles. They have ALREADY started asking me whether I have a boyfriend. I was stunned, because I thought they only ask you that when you're 35 and still collecting ang paos. But I suppose their going by the pre-Industrial Revoltution biological clock, where you married by 11, had 9 kids at 13, went senile at 15, then on your 16th birthday got sealed into a wooden box. You could see both my parents tense up and lean foward, then deflate with relief when I said no, I don't have a boyfriend. Next year, I'll say that his name is Tan Ah Beng, he has 88 piercings on various parts of his body, drives a lorry, has body odour, and is 42 years old.
Tomorrow we're going to see post-Jurassic era peopl, mostly my mom's colleagues etc.
posted by Julie at 4:49 AM
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