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a penguin of very little brain
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| on showing another face |
[Mar. 30th, 2009|05:17 pm] |
I have this bracelet made of mahjong tiles. I like wearing it - I love playing mahjong, and I love looking at the tiles and making kong in my head. I love playing mahjong with my mum, she's so ridiculously competitive and takes such delight in the winning; I love playing with D, who is so happy to learn these Chinese things with me; I love hearing the clank of the tiles and remembering a childhood filled with the noise. It was strange for me, then, to meet a woman from the US last year, who knew it only as a game played by Jewish people. I wish I had thought to ask, "well, how do you explain the tiles written in Chinese?" but for all I know their mahjong tiles are not, and whatever.
I have a pair of earrings, mismatched mahjong tiles, made by a local Perth crafter. I never wear the earrings and the bracelet together, one or the other is quite enough. My friends who are also of the diaspora laugh when I wear the bracelet, or the earrings: oh auntie! they shriek.
I bought the bracelet from a market in Glebe, from another member of the diaspora. I grinned as I picked it up. Do you play? he asked. I was worried it was too Asian.. "Nah," I said. "It's just Asian enough."
I didn't realise until last week that 'too Asian' is not assumed knowledge; not everyone knows what it means. I fumbled through an explanation, of Australia's romantic multiculturalism, this country we live in where everyone thinks they're multicultural because they like Thai green curry but they're happy to fear the Chinese spies, and then I realised how to explain it, what it means to live in Australia as ethnically Chinese (or thereabouts), to walk that line between Chinese but not too-Chinese, to keep oneself safe whilst also keeping one's identity.
We live our lives on a sliding scale. On one end is Hello Kitty, and on the other end is a pile of fried chicken feet. And we walk it every day, trying to be Chinese but not too-Chinese. Hello Kitty is Japanese, you say? Well, that's part of our negotiation, too, it is part of the same scale of being not too Asian.
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This is part of the reason why discussion about cultural appropriation makes me narrow my eyes, makes me frown and makes me close the tab before I get grumpy at the things I cannot change. It's my life, and before I take it outside my space I have to decide whether or not someone's going to grump at me for it, but if I was just doing it because I wasn't Chinese and it was cool, then those same people wouldn't care. Some of those same people are my friends, and they have no idea.
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All I ever want to say about it, I've already said before.
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I can be mistaken as Anglo, and I don't have to wonder what some Chinese people think when I walk past them, tiles on my hand, because they've told me. "My mum taught me," I always reply, "We're Chinese-Malaysian."
It quietens them, but it doesn't quieten me. I wonder how many people think I'm stealing something that belongs to me. |
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| looking up words and phrases and clauses |
[Mar. 2nd, 2009|10:16 pm] |
i started, thinking this might be a remyth; but it didn't quite work out that way.
I was seventeen, and I thought my family was different. I remembered being tiny, standing at the Chinese butcher, peering through the glass at pig trotters and chicken feet and knowing none of my other friends spent their afternoons this way; I remembered being ten, and only just discovering that not everyone ate rice for most meals; I remembered being fourteen and eating pasta for breakfast and being kind of grossed out because pasta is not a breakfast food (and having no idea that my friends mostly thought the same about curry); I remembered being sixteen and inviting a friend to join us for Chinese New Year, and the friend being fascinated by the new things she was learning, things I'd always known. I remembered being sixteen and taking tea and watching my cousin, the joss sticks in her hands, ask for blessings from the kitchen gods as she was wed. I remembered all of these moments, but I didn't think anything of them, I just thought my family had its own traditions, was different in its own way, just like every family.
I was seventeen, and in my first year at uni, and sitting in this lecture on Chinese society, this really basic Asian Studies 101 class, and I recognised my family in every chapter: the shape of my parents' house and the preferences in decorating and the way we deal with people and the present thing I never talk about. And a culture and history cannot be diluted into a 45 minute lecture (or even a full-semester unit), and my family cannot be essentialised into something so simplistic, but that was my epiphany, that moment when I suddenly actually understood why I wasn't like anyone else.
And then I started hanging out with a bunch of Chinese-Indonesians and Chinese-Singaporeans, and that helped. |
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| [book] the fortune cookie chronicles, jennifer 8. lee |
[Jan. 29th, 2009|09:58 pm] |
Oh look, another book review! Is anyone reading these? Hellooo world, it's me, stephanie penguin.
I've been looking to read The Fortune Cookie Chronicles for some time, and I finally got it through an interlibrary loan last week. By Jennifer 8. Lee, The Fortune Cookie Chronicles is an exploration of Chinese food in the USA, an investigation into its role as tool of the Diaspora and its patterns of dispersion. There is some discussion of Chinese food beyond the US, particularly as she attempts to trace the path of food into the US, but the main focus is on its role domestically.
Considering this is a topic in which I continue to be incredibly invested, it was somewhat of a disappointment that the writing was so boring. The information imparted was very interesting, and it was very easy to read, but it was presented in such a way that I found myself skimming whole pages. It felt a little bit at times as if she were showing her credentials as ABC, as it were, little things like "Our conversation was a mix of Mandarin and English" peppered the text, and she transcribed a conversation with Jimmy Wales that didn't really add anything and just felt like gratuitous name dropping! Also she used that inaccurate and annoying term, "ethnic food," very often.
Perhaps this is too harsh. She has done an amazing amount of research, and she talks about social justice, the immigrant experience, race issues, business, and political economy, and the way these things intersect and then some more about food. I was particularly intrigued by some of her social observations, such as when writing of fortune cookies: Americans expect good fortunes; it goes along with our general sense of entitlement. She speaks of being Chinese whilst not in China (she specifically references the concept of hua), and the reason behind fortune cookies being known as Chinese, though they were invented by the Japanese (because as they were gaining popularity, the Japanese Americans were sent to internment amps and their holdings, such as the machines, disappeared.
If you are interested in the history of food, especially the patterns of fusion and change, and how that interacts with race and ethnicity, there is definitely a lot to be learnt. The byline of the book is, if our benchmark for Americanness is apple pie, ask yourself, how often do you eat apple pie? Now how often do you eat Chinese food? and it sets a really great investigative tone. It just felt off, kind of 'hey I bet you never knew this before I'm pretty awesome for showing this to you,' and that was incredibly distracting for me. I will admit that this could have been because I did already know most of it, and maybe if you don't know anything about the food of the Diaspora it will not come off this way. |
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| is the boat that leads out of here |
[Jan. 15th, 2009|09:59 pm] |
it is cumbersome and unwieldy to have to unpack my difference in order to prevent miscommunication due to cultural or individual habits and preferences. i love exploring new things, and embracing new opportunities, and exchanging words with people the same and different, old and new, and i love examining the construction of myself, but i hate explaining it, showing the underbelly of my thoughts; it feels uncouth and rude, a little bit like intentionally showing one's knickers. |
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| the inauthenticy of experience (and the food of the diaspora) |
[Jan. 7th, 2009|08:25 pm] |
Restructure, in White American culture is General Tso's Chicken and Chop Suey, discusses Jennifer 8.Lee's summary of the myths that non-Chinese Americans have about Chinese food. I wrote this blog post prior to having seen the footage, which actually contains a lot of stuff I already knew (the creation of chop suey, the hostilities, etc) but which might be new to people who don't know a lot about the history of food in the Chinese Diaspora. Other people who have also discussed this today are sanguinity here, Johanna at Vegans of Colour here, Dr S here and restructure reposts at racialicious here (linked so you can read the comments).
The ingress of Chinese people through significant immigration (THE DIASPORA) into another country has often been followed by hostilities and aggression. The evolution of Chinese food over the years has been a sort of extension of this, at first remaining strict but then gradually altering to the foreign environments.The development of regionally acclimatised cuisines was at first a response to these hostilities, an attempt to make people feel more at ease with Chinese food and therefore more at ease with Chinese people. As Lee mentions, chop suey, a quintessential dish in Chinese restaurants across the USA, was created for the purposes of softening up the Caucasians, as it were, to be more amenable to Chinese people.
Restructure notes that Caucasian-Americans think that eating Chinese food is evidence of being all worldy and so on. These attitudes extend to Australia, so don't get complacent! "Multicultural cuisine" is seen as evidence of/a benefit of multiculturalism in Australia, and so are "cultural events," and complaints have been made that often these multicultural activities are being restricted to private events/within the home (ref). Those selfish not-white people! etc. So everybody want to go watch the lions dance in the new year so they can show off how accepting they are, and to eat lots of Thai food, but at the same time consider a mosque to be impinging on residents, demonstrating the superficial understanding and acceptance of not-white going on.
Dr S briefly suggests that some people might argue that we should try to only eat representative or "authentic" food, but such an argument is inherantly problematic. The food upon which I was brought up is by this definition inauthentic, being a centuries old fusion of Chinese, Indian and Malay cooking, called Nonya. Yet I would not suggest that the Chinese-Malaysian style is any more or less valid than Sicilian, and I am certainly not about to stop eating it due to its inauthenticity.
Extending on the idea of inauthenticity, does that make something like a vegan laksa inauthentic? It's traditionally made with a whole lot of seafood, so its lack surely makes it as inauthentic as making it without coconut milk. On the other hand, that's why mock meat was created in the first place, so you can't really call any Chinese dish made with mock meat inauthentic - it was done for religious reasons centuries ago.
The idea of defining "authentic" food is further problematised by the idea of authenticity. I was recently accused of not being Chinese, due to my birthplace not being located in the PRC. Although I am not a food, nor a style of cooking, I feel this example highlights how problematic it is to arbitrarily draw lines, and the ways in which some people look to impose an authority on a situation (or perhaps define themselves) by their knowledge of authentic versus inauthentic. |
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| on the promotion from cheche; or, what society says women are when they get married |
[Dec. 31st, 2008|09:40 pm] |
I've spoken before on the significance of aunties, the magic imbued and the distinction between and the way they all coalesce into this mass of love and scolding and middle-aged Chinese lady.
When I talk with my friends who are also ethnically Chinese, I am cheche (姐姐) and occasionally mimi（妹妹); I call the older acquaintances uncle and auntie and when I hang with their little babies I'm cheche. I remember one friend when I was in uni, he did NS before he came to Australia so he was 21 when we were 18, and in our phones and in our emails he was "no uncle" because he was so adamant about being not an uncle and we thought it was so funny, because he was uncle!
But now I'm married and now I'm auntie, the little girls are told to say hello to auntie, not cheche, and this assumption that now that I'm married I am immediately one of the loving, scolding aunties is so imbued in our traditions that nothing I can say will make any difference, and that's so incredibly frustrating.
When I got married and people made assumptions that I was going to be a Mrs or whether I was changing my name, and no one made that assumption about D, that was frustrating and such a clear example of the gender issues in this culture, but I was ready for it.
I wasn't quite ready to be promoted to auntie. My comfort comes in knowing that this one is equal for both of us: D has been promoted also, though the role of uncle is less clear, and certainly does not require scolding and loving and ang pau. |
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| on not speaking chinese |
[Dec. 6th, 2008|11:43 am] |
There's a certain irony in walking alongside someone and saying, "你想学普通话为什么？" Many overseas Chinese / 华人, myself included, will tell you how they cannot speak Mandarin, how they wish they had gone to Chinese school as a kid, how important it is to speak Mandarin, and then turn around and communicate in perfectly serviceable Mandarin. Maybe they only did Mandarin until primary three, or they didn't start learning it until they were older, or maybe they just picked it up as they went. There's a fear there, I think, of not being good enough, but it speaks to humility too, of knowing we'll never be as good as those who still live in the PRC.
Well, we'll never be as good at speaking Mandarin. There are other reasons why being overseas Chinese is awesome. |
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| [book] growing up asian in australia, alice pung (ed) |
[Oct. 11th, 2008|10:04 pm] |
I cannot review this book impartially, and I'm not sorry. I can only review this as an Asian-Australian who grew up in Australia.
Growing Up Asian In Australia is an anthology edited by Alice Pung, unsurprisingly about growing up Asian in Australia. It was published in July, and I am going to force it upon my sister (surprise!), and when she is done I am going to force it upon ![[info]](http://l-stat.livejournal.com/img/userinfo.gif) elaran and then upon linstar, and then after that a queue has already been formed by the one million Chinese-Malaysian Australians with whom I am acquainted.
This book was amazing. It resonated so much for me, about the problematic negotiation of being Asian in Australia, about the search for identity and place, about the way I feel about speaking Mandarin and Cantonese and Bahasa, the way I feel about being Chinese and being Australian and not being Chinese enough or not being Australian enough. Cultural identity is more than how you look or what language you speak or where you were born, and this book is so many anecdotes and stories, tales of going through what I go through and that search for identity, that desire to belong to know who you are.
My favourite tale was 'Destiny,' by Shalini Akhil, about an Indian-Australian who wants to be an Indian Wonder Woman, and the way her grandmother gently guides her. I almost wept as I finished the first piece in the anthology, 'The Relative Advantages of Learning My Language,' by Amy Choi, about not bothering to learn Chinese as a child. I also loved Ken Chau's 'The Terrorists,' about that judgement when you're not from around here.*
Some of the pieces I enjoyed more than others, and some pieces resonated more with me than other pieces did. Only one left me wishing it had not been included, 'Are You Different,' about a Caucasian-Australian couple who internationally adopted a Filipino baby. This piece really jarred, because every other story was about a young Asian-Australian struggling with growing up and trying to become an adult in a predominately 'White' country, whereas this story was about an adult Caucasian woman justifying her international adoption of an Asian child. It just felt a bit off to me in this anthology.
Overall, the anthology is this thoughtful collection of stories. It has taken me about three days (I started on Wednesday night and finished just now, I sulked when I drove to archery today because I couldn't read, I was driving), and some of it was funny, and some of it was painful, and some of it was delightful, but it was all amazing.
In the introduction, Pung says that the anthology is the sort of book she wishes she had had when growing up, and I absolutely agree. We exist! I am not alone.
An interview with Alice Pung and the author of 'Destiny,' Shalini Akhil, can be found here. Growing Up Asian in Australia can be found at major book stores.
* in particular: I want to kill / the fucking bastards / for making me feel that / being born in Australia / and being an Australian / are not the same. I make a point of saying 'Sydney' when I'm asked, and I still feel like I'm betraying something, and I still hate being made to feel like I'm a novelty. |
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| with nothing to do with the viewing |
[Sep. 15th, 2008|07:55 pm] |
a paper lantern for moon festival
The Moon Festival is the fifteenth day of the eighth lunar month, and it has been years since my last Moon Festival Party. As a child we'd form a procession around the property, carefully holding our lanterns before us so as to not burn the delicate cellophane membrane. I remember eating lots of food, and wearing colourful clothes and ultimately burning holes in my butterfly lanterns, every year, without fail.
This year I spent much of the month before Moon Festival in Penang, and as I wandered the streets I was surrounded by stalls selling lanterns of many colours, in paper and cellophane and that new novelty, the battery powered plastic lantern. There were delicious moon cakes and the promise of festivities, and the events of this last month coupled with the looming presence of Moon Festival Future found me determined to host a Moon Party all of my own.
I've posted about the menu at my other blog, which you can find here. I spent about four hours cooking for it, laksa and nasi goreng and gado gado and so many old favourite foods. I bought tamari and made gluten-free passionfruit melting moments, and then I accidentally poisoned Helen with the kuih bangkit, which was not made from rice flour. People ate (and apparently enjoyed) the mooncakes, which pleased me very much, and it was an excellent evening, and I am very appreciative of everyone who came to celebrate the Moon Festival with me.
penguin in a portrait
In other news, we have a new bean bag in the study (it is red!), and this evening I discovered that Matthew Chuk (the UWA guild hack) has a wikipedia entry. |
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| [book] sweet mandarin, helen tse |
[Sep. 4th, 2008|10:25 pm] |
Sweet Mandarin is about the Chinese Diaspora, food and the Chinese experience interwoven through three generations from Guangzhou, to Hongkong and on to England. It is an autobiography of sorts, a family history more than anything else. It talks about Amahs and the slums of HK and the sprawling reach of the triads amongst the Overseas Diaspora; it talks about the dislocation and separation that is so real for many of us who identify as Huaren/Tohngyan/华人, regardless of citizenship and birthplace.
It is an interesting read. At some points it was very emotional for me due to the familiar themes and situations that occurred, particularly in light of my current family situation; at some points it was like a made up thing, tragedy after tragedy and no reflection of any thing familiar to me. At other times I found the writing harsh and the author's attitude very judgmental, and that more than anything else jerked me out of the text several times. It was a good read, but I'm not sure a repeat one, it made me feel a little too uncomfortable. |
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| ...they're always poorly sewn... |
[Aug. 29th, 2008|10:13 am] |
When I got married earlier this year, I thought for quite a while about whether I was going to change my name. I thought about whether I wanted Davyd to change his name, I considered how strongly I felt about us having the same name. If I were more attached to my name, I would have initiated a "who will change their name" discussion instead.
A lot of people were surprised that I changed my name, because I so strongly identify as a feminist or am viewed as an angry feminist or whatever (their whatever, not mine). And this really affected me, because I thought about this for so long and then for my feminism to be cast in doubt because I was changing my name honestly made me rethink my decision, because I don't want any woman in Australia to think that me changing my name is me saying that she must change her name if she marries, because actions are so loud, so much louder than having to explain to every one the one million reasons why changing my name is what I want to do, easier than explaining the one million reasons why it's none of their business, and how it doesn't magically make me someone who doesn't believe that there should be equality in personal relationships.
When my mum married my father, she changed her name because she married and left the country and became a 1970s housewife. Today she is a professional, and she would never dream of changing her name for any reason because Chinese professionals Do Not change their names.
So now I'm here amongst my family, being ridiculously Chinese and learning the names of my cousin's newest child, and freaking out because I'm a professional but I changed my name - does that make me not Chinese? I'm Chinese but I changed my name - does that make me not a professional? I live in Australia but I changed my name - does that make me not a feminist?
I am Chinese, and I am a professional, and I am a feminist and I am an Australian. And I changed my name.
Don't doubt my identity, because I can do that for myself and I don't need your judgement.
(and you're an arse for thinking it's your right to make that judgement anyway) |
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| cultural appropriation: what's left behind when you're done with your fun |
[Aug. 25th, 2008|03:00 pm] |
I saw an auntie on Saturday night. She was attending a work function in the hotel in which we are staying, so she was all dressed up with pretty clothes and painted toe nails and a diamante swastika pendant on a chain around her neck, because she is Buddhist.
The bus I've been catching from the hospital meanders down Dato Keramat and past a building with a swastika carved into its face.
The coffin is draped in a silk covering, the covering patterned with swastikas; I visited a shop selling sparkling, multicoloured swastikas; I drove past cast iron swastikas forming the shapes in fences.
The thing about cultural appropriation is that maybe you think it's fun, or just a symbol, or whatever, but sometimes it leaves a legacy that means this religious symbol is pretty universally equated with white supremacists and hate crimes (and Nazis) in the West. This is interesting, though, because I would suggest that Jesus' cross has also been co-opted by white supremacists, but the image of a crucifix doesn't inspire that visceral, gut reaction. Well, not as much, anyway.
Anyway. Cultural Appropriation: stop stealing other people's stuff. You might think your appropriation is harmless, but have you asked? |
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| be this bright in the moon |
[Aug. 8th, 2008|06:15 pm] |
This is for IBARW, but I'd be making this post regardless.
I was reading Sanguinity's post about doing the 50books_poc challenge this year. The challenge is to read fifty books by authors of colour, and she entered the challenge to help her expand out of what she described as her racially-insulated life. That's really awesome, and she got a lot out of it and her post is definitely worth reading, and worth considering.
I've been going the other way lately, reducing instead of expanding, guilty that I'm so immersed in Western culture that I don't read books by Chinese authors or have any sort of Chinese or Malaysian literary knowledge.
I remember flipping through books, never seeing faces like my little Chinese face, and though as I have grown my face has changed, the memory remains. I can recite the stories of Cinderella and Sleepy Beauty and Rapunzel and a dozen fairytales of European origin and debate their merit, but I can't tell you anything about Chinese fairytales. I don't know when I committed the European fairytales to memory, because they've been intertwined in my reading and storytelling for so long, but I can tell you that I learnt about Mulan thanks to Disney, and after we watched it my mum said, it's not a terrible translation.
I can list a page worth of members of the Greek pantheon and what they patron, and I can tell you things that happen in the Old Testament of the Bible, but I can't remember why white tiger, red phoenix, black turtle and green phoenix are important, or who comes next after the Jade Emperor. I can name a dozen North American SF authors (of Anglo ethnicity) without thinking too long, but I can't name a single Chinese SF author.
I admit that I'm exaggerating, a little (not about the SF thing, though): I do know a bit about this, but it pales in comparison to my knowledge of European/British/Western literature. And as someone with equal parts Chinese and Anglo ethnicity, I feel like my knowledge should be a little more equal than that.
I'm reading a random mythology book right now: it's one third Viking, one third Greek, and one third 'Oriental.' So you see what I mean?
So I'm making the effort to read more authors of Chinese ethnicity/from China, and then after that, after I feel like I know something concrete about one half of my own cultural literary history and contemporary literature, then maybe I'll be ready for the 50books challenge, though I plan to tackle it by continent, or region, or intersections, or something. But that's an issue for another post. |
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| qiu xiaolong, 'death of a red heroine;' and on chinese family names |
[Aug. 6th, 2008|09:11 pm] |
I recently read Death of a Red Heroine, the first book in a series by Qiu Xiaolong. This series of novels is about Chief Inspector Chen Cao, a cop struggling to find his place in early 90s Shanghai. Death of a Red Heroine is a mystery novel but it's also a discussion of that conflict between socialism and capitalism that is still a point of contention now. The novel is placed so firmly in a certain space, and it was written in English but reading it, it doesn't feel like it was written for a purely Western audience as such. It feels like it was written for me, someone already familiar with a lot of these themes, and familiar with the China of the time, because there are so many little hints that place it in Shanghai in the early 90s, showing rather than telling.
Davyd's mum has borrowed it and taken it on her trip to Europe. As she is someone with a negligible knowledge of mainland Chinese customs and history and society, I am very interested to know how much she understood, and how many references were unfamiliar to her.
I wandered into Dymocks a few months ago to pick up a copy of Death of a Red Heroine, and I couldn't find it so I wandered around for a bit and finally found it under 'X,' and I was so disappointed. Borders, also, has him under 'X,' and it's a little disappointing that some people still can't identify the difference between a family name and a personal name, and that some of those people are booksellers who should arguably be able to correctly shelve books by author name.
So for your benefit, here is a simple (but problematic) rule of thumb: a Chinese family name will probably not be two syllables. Of course, this is complicated because names like 'Huang' and 'Liu' are clearly one syllable, but that might not be so obvious for people who don't speak Mandarin or a main dialect, but please try and give it a go none the less.
Why it's problematic: a family name might be two syllables, and some (non Han) names might be more, but the one hundred most common surnames are all one syllable, and account for 85% of the surnames in use. |
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| like i've lived too much |
[May. 10th, 2008|11:09 pm] |
Thirteens and black cats have never meant much to me, though I have avoided ladders for safety reasons.
I remember in high school, a friend complained about some Chinese people who were interested in buying her parents' house, up until they got there and realised the street address had a four in it and so it all fell through. Of course, I think I said, it's like death, and thought, how could they not have realised? and then I didn't think about it again until today.
We went to view a townhouse, and I was looking out the window for number fourteen, and then we arrived and Davyd said it was number four, and then I realised what that meant. We looked inside anyway, but the damage was done: no matter how brilliant it was, I wouldn't have been able to bring myself to buy a house that was numbered four, let alone one that was numbered four twice.
But then, there is not-quite truth in that statement, too, for there are things that can be done, and all these unfortuitous things can be surmounted. That's what the mirrors and the bells are for.
And the 福, upside-down, that sits on our kitchen door.
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| some penguins had a party and all their friends came |
[Apr. 22nd, 2008|10:09 pm] |
We woke on Saturday morning to rain, a constant droning on the roof. I love it when it rains, but rainy days are days for cooking things for hours and staying indoors, not holding garden parties.
We ventured out to my old hairdresser, a hilarious woman named Fran who works out of Cutting Edge in Midland. There was some consultation as I produced the ornate things I wanted to slot into my hair, and some confusion as I kept complaining about height and body, which I inexplicably loathe in hair.
 My hair piece was actually formed out of the middle piece of a traditional Malay headpiece. The pieces are usually worn on top of the head, facing forwards, to form sun rays emerging from the head. There was no way I was doing this, though, and I prefer wearing my hair with pieces through it, so I felt this was a nice compromise. The headpiece belongs to a Malaysian girl with whom I work.
We returned from hair related things to discover that the marquee looked amazing. The marquee was only completed at 0800, in the rain, and then Davyd, Bernard, Zanchey, Matt, Essie, Linda and Michael started setting the tables and putting things in place, and by the time we returned it looked fantastic, all the cranes scattered on the tables and the napkins folded beautifully.
 I bought all of the hanging decorations on a recent trip to Melbourne, so if anyone happens to know of anyone who needs to use some Chinese wedding decorations, let me know. Also, the 120 pairs of chopsticks were found by rummaging through the drawers in my mother's kitchen, and in our kitchen. Chinese homes tend to have an excess of chopsticks, due to the tradition of purchasing an entire new set every Chinese New Year. As such, if anyone needs to borrow a whole lot of chopsticks, again, let me know.
At about 1300 Matt went on an emergency run to Bunnings to buy mats to put by marquee's entry, to stop people from sinking into the damp grass there. By the time he returned the rain had stopped, though, and the sun had come out, and that was awesome.
Amanda and SJ were amazing with my makeup. They threw me in a makeup chair at Myer in Perth, where the woman at the Clinique counter painted things on my face and we found perfect lips and eyes at Shishedo, both of which I've blogged about previously. I was not first to get my makeup done on the day - first was SJ's mum, who wanted her makeup to be done in time for her to watch kickoff of the derby.
My wedding dress was tailored for me by a bespoke tailor in Penang in 2005. It sounds ridiculous, especially given we didn't actually do anything else wedding related in the time between July 2005 and setting the date in December 2007, but three years later I still believe it was the best decision. I knew then that I would be wearing the qipao when we married, and at that point I was about to turn 23, and hadn't changed weight or shape in about six years. It is expensive to tailor qipao in Australia, and there was no way I was spending AUD$500+ for some sort of one wear only dress. A qipao is designed to be worn again, not worn once.
 Two weeks before the wedding I tried the dress on, and the zipper broke. I had it repaired by Snip N Stitch clothing alterations, who were happy to do the repairs but told me I had to find the invisible zip on my own, as very long, bright red invisible zips were hard to come by around here. Fortunately the crazy wool store at Subi crossroads had some. Cost of repairs plus zip was $32.95.
The qipao fit fine, though you should note that they're made to fit snug, which made sitting a challenge. "I have to hike my skirt up," I complained to my mother, later. "That's how it works," she replied, like it was something I already knew but had obviously forgotten. It also made bending over a chore, so all night I made people pick things up for me. Essie reminded me, though, at least I was still able to go to the loo on my own, some wedding dresses require assistance when you sit to pee.
It is customary to wait one month after the birth of a baby before gift giving. This is a hold over from the days when babies would often die during their first few days, and pragmatically there is no point giving gifts to a baby who dies a few days later. The gifts are also gifts and wishes for the baby's future, usually represented by a whole lot of gold jewellery. It is this that I was wearing, the gold given to me after my first month, so that I was draped in the wishes of my family.
 For the longest time I was determined not to hold a bouquet. At the last, I was convinced to hold something, so I agreed to a bouquet, but only if it could be styled similarly to the bouquets that Tom and Max's bridesmaids held a few years ago. The result, designed by Linda, was simply magnificent. It was understated yet bright and not all droopy like a teardrop, and I loved it.
As I peered out the window, waiting for the time to be right, and for all to be ready, I was delighted to discover that many people had turned up with hats and fascinators, and in Alex's case with a cane. Maelkann wore a bright orange suit, as promised, and my view from the window was all bright colours and big hats and I was so pleased.
I was reluctant to do a stately walk down the aisle, there's so much possession and propriety implicit in that. The compromise was that Davyd, Zanchey, Bernard, SJ and Susie would chat with people somewhere around the frontish area, whilst dad and I would meander over. I sank slowly into the ground as I walked, and my stocking slowly failed (I couldn't wear a garter belt as the qipao has no give for it, and the elastic on the stay-up failed).
The sun was in our eyes, because although we'd run through the day before, we'd ended up in the wrong position, so halfway through the ceremony we crept forward, out of the glare. At prodding from the celebrant, we included anecdotes and readings, how we met through Sailor Moon and then SJ read a bit from Now We Are Six, because everybody loves a Pooh quote.
Later, we took a giant group photo. Afterwards, we dismissed friends to play croquet and cricket (thanks to dr k and dave for the croquet set, and grahame for the cricket set), and half of Davyd's extended family took "and if you're family, you have to stick around for more photos" as an opportunity to nick off to the pub to watch the end of the derby. A number of friends ran off to the Junction for icecream, though many of them managed to get lost. In hindsight, we should have included directions to the Junction as part of the wedding pack, along with the map to the venue.
group photo, sans amanda and essie :o(
We meandered around the estate, taking photos as they occurred to us and pausing for champagne, and for me to unlock my ibook. I discarded the failing stockings before we headed to the marquee, where many of our friends were already well into the beer, and had almost demolished the Squire.
 On a table to the side was a basket from Singapore, overflowing with ang pau and surrounded by envelopes. The Chinese custom shies away from registries and gifts, leaning more towards things that will fit in little red envelopes, that is, money and jewellery. This is considered more practical. "No one is writing their name!" my mother despaired, so now we have no idea who gave what. It is usual to take note of each red packet, the amount and who gave it, but I prefer it this way. Now, if someone chose not to give us anything, we will never know, and that is fine because gifts should be no obligation, anyway.
A Chinese wedding banquet is a lavish, extended affair, comprising eight to ten courses (not including dessert), each served individually to the middle of the table, for communal eating. It is sprawling, taking usually about two to three hours, and it is important to eat selectively at each course, or by meal's end you can find yourself bloated, and unable to sample the delicious dishes which round out the banquet. I have blogged about the catering we used in my foodie blog here, and about our delicious vegan and gluten-free (double chocolate and raspberry) wedding cupcakes here.
 Although the catering was done by Lotus, and the cupcakes were constructed by Susie, Amanda, Sajee and Essie in a feat of awesome, and the fruit was prepared by my mother and an auntie, the serving and related was done by Linda and Michael, with assistance from two of the kids from archery and a colleague of Davyd's.
Linda and Michael went above and beyond, volunteering to come early Saturday morning to assist with setup, and staying late to help us clear away. All we'd wanted them to do was coordinate the food! Their help was amazing and we are so appreciative of their contribution to the Really Big Party. Linda also did all the flower related things, my beautiful tiny bouquet and the corsages and buttons.
There were a handful of speeches, limit of 120 seconds. SJ wrote hers onto a crane; we had to wait for her to unfold it. There was some music and some dancing, cheers to Meggie for using her contacts to get us the sound gear. I turned around at one point to discover that some people I occasionally call friends had loaded some very choice songs onto my ibook, cheers for that, guys. Whereby 'choice' should be prefaced by 'questionable.'
Linda, Michael, Zanchey and Bernard stayed with us until well past midnight, cleaning and clearing and putting away. Eventually, exhausted, we kicked everyone out though the job was unfinished, and waved Linda and Michael off, and we four tumbled into the car and Bernard drove us all home.
As Zanchey stumbled out of the car at 0130, he reached behind Davyd's head and withdrew a top hat. "Oh, what!" I exclaimed, that he had not worn it in photos, and he shut the door and we drove away.
Thank you so much to everyone who came, it was delightful and both Davyd and I had an excellent Party, and we hope that everyone else did, too.
Photos:
- Full set of photos taken by Amanda can be found here. There are about 600 of them, though, so I have posted a small selection of my favourites here
- Some can be found here by my frellie
dortamurrewnad
- essie's picks of her own photos; full set can be found here
- essie's picks of amanda's photos
- these were photos taken by thanners
- Anil took some photos which you can find here
- Photos by Davyd's dad can be found here
- Photos by Alex here (everyone is pulling such dour faces, though!)
Please let me know if you have some that aren't linked here, and if you've taken some but haven't put them up please do that and let me know.
Financial analysis to follow when it all gets sorted out. |
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| a moment of |
[Apr. 18th, 2008|01:53 pm] |
As we arrived in Singapore I realised, with dread, that I had forgotten to bring ang pau for auntie's children.
We stopped by the concierge desk at first opportunity. "I forgot red packets," I explained. "Do you know where we can buy them?" The concierge suggested Chinatown, or perhaps a bookstore; then suggested we wait whilst he checked to see if he had any spare. He did, and I took three for auntie's children.
The crisis was averted, and the service at the Fairmont continued to be superb our entire stay. |
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| auntie is a magic word |
[Apr. 16th, 2008|01:12 pm] |
In Chinese dialects there is a distinction between the auntie who is mother's sister, and the auntie who is father's sister, and so on. But everyone just says 'auntie,' even in the middle of a sentence in Mandarin, just creates this gigantic, amorphous mass of scolding, loving aunties.
We sat at a table on the edge of a carpark just off Bukit Timah Road. "What?" a grumpy old man barked. "Waiting for Auntie," I replied, my voice falling into that annoying Penang whine (though I was in Singapore by this time), and he melted away at the magic word.
Auntie is the old lady crossing the street; Auntie is my mother's sister or my father's sister; Auntie is a woman I met when I was six; Auntie gives me ang pau and tells me to eat more; Auntie is not related to me; Auntie is obligation and permission and guilt. |
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| as we turn down the lights |
[Mar. 12th, 2008|10:08 pm] |
The race riots of 1969 were considered to be the fault of the economic and wealth disparity that existed between the poorer Malays and the more wealthy Chinese. This disparity developed for various historical reasons, but most obviously because many Chinese people had come in to Malaysia and set up businesses, which moved the flow of wealth in that direction. The NEP was established in 1971 to compensate for that economic and social disparity, giving ethnic Malays preference in government positions, university placements and government tenders. The NEP involved a redistribution of wealth and ownership from other Malaysians and foreigners to Bumiputras, and was supposed to increase the overall national economy.
Its emphasis was on actual ownership, rather than training, a sort of constant bandaid rather than solution. The NEP officially ended in 1990, but is considered to still live on today in many forms.
Lim Guan Eng was sworn in as Penang's head of state on Tuesday; this morning the very first thing I read was this headline: Penang abandons pro-Malay policy.
I am trying to be reasonable as I write this, not talking about what a shit program NEP was. So this is kind of dry, but inside my head I'm leaping around freaking out (coalition with PAS?! WE'RE RUINED) and incredibly hopeful (NO NEP!) and I'm trying to summarise it so you understand, but every time I think about it I can't stop grinning.
There will be no overnight change; given the control still remaining with the central government, and the continued fear that it will take funding away from Penang, there may never be any real change; but I am hopeful.
Some reading: Slaying an Immortal Tiger (old article on NEP); Malaysia PM: Lessons to be learnt; Penang's leaders abandon pro-Malay policy. If you're interested in this, Mahathir's The Malay Dilemma is very interesting reading. |
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| on your shoulders |
[Mar. 9th, 2008|04:23 pm] |
I am excited; awash in a sea of joy and confusion. UMNO has been the ruling party in Malaysia since Merdeka fifty years ago, and its power has been pretty concrete. There are many reasons why I grew up in Australia and not Malaysia, and UMNO is one of the biggest of them. At yesterday's national election, it won with a simple majority. This sounds like nothing but the government no longer has power to make constitutional changes, and is a sign of dissatisfaction across the country with the loss of four state assemblies, including my beloved tiny island of Penang. I'm afraid and I'm concerned but most of all I'm excited, and I hope.
Links: BBC; ABC; Associated Press; Straits Times. |
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