Wednesday, February 24, 2010

Gung Hee Fatt Choi

My parents adopted my sister Margaret from Hong Kong a few years before I was born. We had a children's book by Leo Politi called, "Moy Moy" It was about a little girl in Hong Kong who was celebrating Chinese New Year with her brothers. Moy Moy became Margaret's pet name. In the book a lot of people say, "Ni Hao Ma, Moy Moy" I naturally thought that meant "Happy New Year, Moy Moy". I loved that book. It was full of gorgeous, colorful paper dragons and parades. I read it over and over again. I practiced saying "Ni Hao Ma". I felt exotic.














When I was 29 years old and living in Hawaii I had a job at a kitchen supply store. On Chinese New Year, I was at the front registers with Trina Ishikaro. Great girl. I started saying goodbye to the customers with , "Ni Hao Ma!" Sometimes they would already be walking toward the door when I would remember. I would shout, "NI HAO MA!" as they made their exit.

Finally, Trina said, "Lucy, first of all that last lady was Japanese and second, why do you keep asking people how they are in Chinese as they are leaving?" Great. I was yelling "HOW ARE YOU!" in Chinese to Japanese people as they walked away from me. How ugly can one American get?

This Chinese New Year was much more reverent, very serious. My 87 year old father is staying with us this month. He spends a month at a time with all of his New England based kids and the rest of the year in India. Chinese New Year fell on Sunday this year so we were able to eat breakfast together. We talked about Chinese New Year throughout the meal. I told everyone my "HOW ARE YOU!" story (for the 50th time because I like that story). We found an old National Geographic dedicated to Chinese New Year. Chinese New Year was definitely the hot topic of the day.

Later on that day, I went to Sam's Club for a big shopping trip. It was time for dinner when I got home. I got everyone(except for that 87 year old) to help me bring everything into the kitchen: but that is it. I like to put things away myself. I have a system. I got everything into the cupboards except for the tampons (sorry.it's no story without them.) I had bought a big box and separated them. Half to go in the downstairs bathroom and half to go upstairs. They were in discreet brown paper lunch sacks on the counter.

I set the table (it was also St. Valentine's Day) and started to prepare dinner. When I turned around I saw that my father had neatly placed one tampon at the top of everyone's place setting. He must have thought that they were either chopsticks or Chinese cracker's that we were going to pop after dinner. It was the funniest thing that I have ever seen in my life. I didn't know what to do. I collected them of course (can you imagine the boy's reactions?!) and I didn't say a word but I am sure that he noted their absence.