The lazy Susan spins round and round the table. Obnoxiously loud talking and shouting occurs throughout the whole room, so it sounds more like a shopping center than a fancy restaurant. Food passes by my in revolving rounds, never stopping long enough for me to grab a good piece, but never leaving me too quickly in order for me to get any food at all. I watch as my parents laugh and joke with their childhood friends in a different language, one that is barely discernible to my mind and ears. Then when they turn and talk to my grandparents, I don't even have the will to pay attention. The languages are sometimes rough, sometimes coarse, sometimes smooth, and all the time varied. An adult asks for some more tea. I am by the teapot and pour for them. They do the universal thank you sign of tapping the table with their three fingers together. This doesn't even register. I pick up my chopsticks and try to grab some food. The lazy Susan spins away.
It's sometimes a never-ending cycle. One where I find joy and comfort in my culture and all of its small niceties. Then I find I am tortured by their ineptitude or ingratitude. But it always returns back to happiness that I am part of this hybrid culture, that I belong to a great world where I can be the bridge that covers the gap between two different worlds. By now, you may have guessed I am talking about my Asian background in an American setting. My parents are immigrants from Hong Kong, so it's not like they didn't know any English or anything about the Western culture before they arrived. They had a sense for it all, since Hong Kong was a British province for some time. I take that into consideration when I think about my own culture. However, my parents weren't fluent in English and neither were my grandparents. In fact, my parents spoke a different dialect from my grandparents, since my parents went to Cantonese city schools and my grandparents grew up with very little education in the countryside. I guess that's where I got my taste for Asian countryside food. The Chinese culture is splintered in the sense that each different regions speaks a different dialect. Imagine living in New York and speaking English, but then moving one city over to Boston and not understanding a word they say. At least that's how I imagine it.
This is part of who I am. Creating comparisons and bridging gaps in my knowledge between what I know in America and what I can only guess happens in Hong Kong or China. Not only does my family experience communication misunderstandings like every other typical family, but we also don't understand each other simply because we do not share the same language. We are different from a lot of families and yet we still manage to work it out. My culture dictates that no matter who you are, you have to work hard in order to get somewhere. My parents were born under this motto and so I inherited it. Although my grandparents were poor when they were growing up, they managed to still make a living and transport our family to America. I find that inspiring, if not fascinating. Everything that a "normal" family may do, we do it in a different sense. Take Thanksgiving for example, where most families have turkey and mashed potatoes, we have turkey and mashed potatoes. But that's where the similarities end and the differences begin. We add Asian dishes to our line up, such as fried rice and Cantonese-style chicken or Peking Duck. We eat and say our thanks, but we do so in our multitude of languages. We bring in Chinese, Japanese desserts, such as red-bean soup or Mochi. We don't stay confined to the traditions of typical Americans. We have our own way of celebrating.
These differences are just touching the tip of the iceberg. How it all affects my life? That's to come later.
