So my grand aunt died yesterday. We believe she died on Thursday night but no one discovered her body till Saturday morning.
But anyway.
went for the whole Chinese wake ceremony yesterday.
Was there and you know how Chinese funerals are, lots and lots and lots of ceremonial chanting and praying and weeping and burning.
I thought it was really... special, though, in a way.
The interesting thing about last night's ceremony was coz the chinese head sifu there for the ceremony had two really young apprentice. And it got me thinking about our whole tradition that way dying.
And with many of my relatives becoming Christian, PRAISE THE LORD really, I think this is going to be the last time I'd ever get to witness a chinese funeral. That's why i really wanted to go for the burial today but I have to go for camp, so i can't go.
But part of me, i felt, as pompous the whole occasion was, and as a Christian everything yesterday was basically a waste right, i couldn't help but feel that a part of that Chinese tradition and perhaps heritage, is dying... if not dead, with my generation. With my dad's generation even. It's pratically dead, you know.
There's a part of me that mourn the death of that, because after being in America and going through those religion and culture classes, I can't help but feel that the past, as pompous/pointless as some traditions are, is something we should try to preserve because more and more of it is becoming lost with time. There's something beautiful to tradition, you know, there's something beautiful to it.
It's not the worship of idols that I support, nor is it the pointless burning of paper buildings and cars and "gold bars". It's not the belief in the 8 layers of hell and the visitation of the soul that I believe in. It's not. I'm a Christian and I am very well aware of the pointlessness of those belief... But, I feel that the practices and the rituals of those rites are part of an identity being Chinese, you know, and that should not be just left to die out.
There should be a value in that, should there be? A value in a thousand year old tradition. There really should be. As much as cultural identity seperates and divides society, I really don't think we should all turn into a walmart nation, that's all I am saying.
I got interested in Japan because of all the culture and tradition they have, and is losing like every other country out there. But you know, I look at my own ethnic identity and I can't help but feel that, we too came from a very rich background, but dude, it has all been lost, lost to time, lost to us not ever being close to our ethnicity to begin with.
I want to be proud to be a Hakka. to be a Chinese. And when friends ask me "what are you?" I can tell them that I am Chinese, and I am Hakka... But dude, how chinese am I? Only by NAME, dude, only by NAME.
I don't think the past is something that we should be so willingly to give up on because, once gone, you know... it's gone. And all the things that make this world so diverse and interesting will just merely become a series of strip malls and walmarts. Dude, and as pointless a burning paper cars and paper houses and gold bars are, I think that's way more interesting than just... nothing you know..
and as much as ethnic identity divides society, it's also what makes this world a really interesting place and gives character to society.
I understand the spritual implications of tradition and traditional rituals... But, i think it's also a loss that we should lose our cultural identity-- what makes you Chinese elaine? what makes you Hakka?
I have absolutely no idea.
