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Happy Independence Day, america.  Yesterday, we went to temple and my grandparents hired a new servant.  Both should be discussed.

We are Daoist…but also kind of Buddhist.  I asked my grandmother if she learned what we pray to as a child, and she laughed, “Who learns these things?”  So, I really don’t know who knows, and if I were more adept at reading Chinese, I could probably look up the names of deities written beneathe each figure, but I only know maybe one out of every three characters, if that, so it’s a bit impossible.  In high school, I did a group project about Daoism, but reading about the traditions in English is very different from doing things.  The customs are also so engrained culturally that it can vary from region to region and family to family because it’s how you lead your life, not a separate “religion compartment” that you open up to find an instructional manual.

My paternal grandmother told me to “make wishes,” but I find prayer a complex undertaking.  English?  Mandarin?  Taiwanese?  Does it matter?  Putting my desires and aspirations into words feels false, for these thoughts, not typically verbalized, are ill-fitted to my stilted prose.  So, too, are my aspirations prosaic.  If I ask for one “thing” for each member of my immediate familiy, I feel guilty for neglecting my grandparents’ health.  If I rotate through my relatives, who am I to decide what would most benefit each of their lives?  Then, too, if i am judicious in selecting spiritual boons, shouldn’t I concentrate my summoning powers on starving children and war-torn communities?

The whole experience is smoky, from the incense sticks we light to the god money we burn.  You enter from the right-hand door and exit from the left.  The doorways often have raised thresholds, because the gods can float; they don’t need to step over the panel the way we do.  My family takes a rather agnostic approach; my mother laughs a bit at some of the bizarre attributes we ascribe to our deities, but still teaches us the customs because she respects the institution.

Yesterday also saw the advent of a new servant.  JP once made the odd claim that Mongolia is the Mexico of Asia.  Not true.  I think East Asian nations have a relationship with Southeast Asia similar to the US with Mexico.  My grandmother explained to me that, in the early days, Taiwan hired many Filipino laborers.  The problem was that “they liked to go out on weekends, and they didn’t do work on Sundays because they would go to church.”  The labor force thus shifted to the Vietnamese, and I’m not sure if there was any problem with them.  Lee Papa mentioned that Taiwanese men started marrying Vietnamese women, so perhaps households were loathe to exploit “their own.”  At any rate, most workers now come from Indonesia.

Whether motivated by an intent to prevent exploitation or to protect Taiwanese menial laborers, the government passed laws restricting who could hire workers from Southeast Asia.  Households may only do so if someone is elderly or disabled.  Because my grandmother has been having knee troubles, my grandparents have hired a worker to help out around the house.  Two years ago, they had Anda, who was boisterous and claimed girlfriends all over Taiwan.  she ran away with one of them.  Because of the labor laws, they had to wait 6 months; then, the agent brought Lily.  Lily was very delicate and didn’t last very long.  She suffered from depression and went home.  Anda was my age; Lily, a couple years younger.  Yesterday, the agent brought Dina.

The interview with my uncle and his wife ranged from more understandable questions like, “Are you going to run away?” to odd/preposterous pronouncements from the agent, “She only looks dirty because she’s dark.”  the agent didn’t strike me as particularly genuine, sharing details of Dina’s life about which she was quite mistaken.  She tried to assure my family that this would be a good fit, but it became clear that she didn’t know much about Dina.

The entire system is exploitative, but my grandparents do need the help, and they treat their employees with respect and care.  at the same time, I don’t feel comfortable having Dina do things for me, as I’m neither old nor infirm.  I left all my laundry until today to do, so I was about 3/4 done this morning when Dina took over.  (I’m slow.)  It’s the guilt thing again.

She calls my aunt tai-tai (wife, or the Chinese equivalent of Madame), my grandparents Grandma and Grandpa, and me jie-jie (older sister).  Which is cute, but she’s 27, so she’s older than I am.  On the other hand, everyone in my family calls me jie-jie, because my mom’s younger sister is cute and affectionate, and she started calling me that.  So, I guess it’s not really a subservient thing.

My uncle, aunt, and cousin went to Kaoshiung today.  Before he left, my cousin talked to the fish: “I’m leaving now.  You guys be good!”  So cute!

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I don’t think I’ve adequately worked through the power structure thing, but I’ll take a break now to share some pictures.

Here’s what a temple looks like.

I didn’t take pictures inside, but I did take pictures of the god money part.

This was the temple we went to with my maternal grandparents.  My dad’s village is in the mountains, and the temple there is set against this backdrop:

It’s enough to make you feel spiritual, isn’t it?