These are the two out of three interviews I had.
The following interview is with Toby Joseph (Indian background)

This is another interview with Ying Zhang (Chinese background)

I am still researching on Mother’s Day. I am worried that the interviews might be inconsistent with the research. The three people I interviewed said that Mother’s Day doesn’t mean much to them. I’m not really sure how to make use of the interviews.

I have been doing research on Swedish midsummer and I just wanted feedback on what topics I should include before posting more detailed information. Some of my topics are:

– brief history/background of midsummer

– traditions

– food/drinks

– dances/music

– why it’s so much more popular in Sweden than in other countries

– brief background of midsummer celebrations in other countries (Denmark, Britain)

– midsummer celebration in NY (both in Battery park and Throgsneck)

So far I am planning to interview the owner of a Swedish candy store that just opened in the West Village, though I don’t think he’ll want me to record him. I am also planning to video tape an interview with my mom. I will also create a survey to send to all the Swedish people I know. Hopefully I will be able to get in touch with someone from the Swedish Club in Throgsneck as well. I would also probably be able to interview people from the Swedish Consulate who are involved in organizing the midsummer celebration in Battery Park every year. Please let me know if you have any suggestions. Thanks!

I think it would interesting to focus on the differences of observance of this holiday.

When my family and I celebrate this holiday, it is extravagant. There is more food than on a Thanksgiving dinner. When we go, there is usually at least fifteen people. However, when I was speaking to my maternal uncle, when celebrates, he follows the customs of his mother-in-law. When they go, they keep everything really simple. They burn some incenses and that’s it. I want to know why there is large difference between the way we celebrate this holiday.

Our differences raises these questions:
1. Does having a lot of food make more of holiday for the living than the dead?
2. Does making the holiday more festive diminish some of its importance?
3. To what extent do the celebrations of this holiday differ in different regions of China?
4. How have these practices changed since immigration to NY?
5. Is there a “right” way to celebrate a holiday? Must we follow how it was practiced back then?

– I will do a lot more interviews. I do speak Cantonese, but a lot of people from China speak mandarin. And my mandarin is embarrassing.
– Maybe I’ll just study how to ask my interview questions and if the interviewees let me record, I’ll ask my mom to interpret them. I’m not too sure about how to do that yet. Or maybe I’ll just stick to English- and Cantonese-speaking populations.

– I will do a videochat with my relatives in China soon and will post that up the interview up.

– I found a DVD about Qingming and I will use that as a source to describe the history of the holiday.

Do you by any chance know how the dragon boat festival is celebrated differently in NY than in China?

uhhh i have no idea really LOLS

never raced in china before ahaha !

lol~ok~how do you all prepare for the race? details pleasezzz!! xD

we train like 4 times a week on the water

& go to the gym to build up endurance

we look out with what we eat and for the race we make sure our body has good rest and we bring ID’s

wow~4 times a week? for how many weeks? Is it too late for me to join? hehehe xD

since april man !

never too late

april til like oct/nov

wow! that’s serious dedication!

LOLS, it is serious dedication !

theres training on weekends at 9am

Is this at flushing meadows?

nah at marina !

bayside?

nah, near citi field !

well for now i go on thursdays

only?

and then on tuesdays

oh

yeah im busy on weekends

tues and thurs at 9am?

7pm

i think there’s some changes in the regulations

like people who are gonna join have to pay in order to be in the team

and you have to buy your own water gear

and train on your own aside from the dbing

and take fitness tests

wow!!

I guess Double Ninth Festival was less popular than I expected. I have decided to choose another holiday called Qingming Festival.

The name may be misleading, but the Qingming is holiday and not a festival. It started many years ago to celebrate and honor the ancestors. This old holiday is an interesting one because it is steeped with Taoist and Confucian beliefs.

I have celebrated this holiday for as long as I remember, but I do not know much about it before my generation. Therefore, I asked my grandmother’s view on the holiday and its transformation from her time in China until now in New York.

I interviewed my grandmother and there are some key points that I want to clarify a bit before you watch.

In the Chinese religion, there is belief in an underworld, but it very different from what we know as hell. The underworld is just another place a dead person’s spirit goes. Think of it as immigration. The person is born into the light world and then migrates to the dark world. Therefore, ancestors are believed to be very close to the living and when the living burn spirit money (Hell bank notes), the dead are supposed to receive it.

There are “lucky” foods to eat. The names of some foods sound like words denoting something positive. Therefore, generations after generations, people eat the same food.

I did an interview with my grandma. She lived in the rural villages for a few years, but mostly grew up in the city of Guangzhou.

Qingming – Interview *I don’t know why one or two words got cut off*

I think that this holiday will have a lot more information to talk about than the previous proposal.

I would like to find more information on the Chinese government deciding to make Qingming a national holiday after many years of declaring the holiday too “traditional.”

I also have relatives who live in the rural countryside. When I say rural, I mean no-indoor-plumbing rural. I think it would be very interesting to see their take on the holiday. I wonder if they bring a live chicken there. But I am most interested if the holiday is only celebrated by males.

The holiday is usually celebrated on April 5th (Gregorian calendar). It already passed, but I have a huge stash of joss paper and spirit money at home. I can take pictures of those items so people can get an idea of what everything looks like.

I would like to explore why Qingming remains a popular holidays, whereas other ones, like Double Nine Festival seem to fade into obscurity.

What is the most appealing about this holiday? Does growing up in New York change anything about the view of the holiday? For my peers who are raised in NY, if they ever have children, would they choose to celebrate this holiday with their children?

In New York, there is a lot more liberty choose and it would be interesting to see what people choose and why.

This weekend I attended the Cinco de Mayo Festival in Flushing Meadow Park, Queens. I spoke to people there but unfortunately didn’t get the interviews as I had planned. However, this is the first of many events that will be going on around this time period and it was a good starting point to observe the workings of how the holiday is celebrated.The first thing I noticed is the advertising. This was a hotspot for brands to get their name out there, and attract people by giving away freebies such as:

This is telling of the way this holiday has been commercialized. Chase bank set up a stand with some very dedicated and pushy women forcing a new bank account upon innocent festival-strollers. Maybe they targeted this group because they know “New Yorkers” don’t care enough to try to be polite to these women and end up falling victim. One thing I found peculiar about the advertising was that most of this festival was sponsored by Inca Kola… a Peruvian soda.

Which brings me to the point that what I saw at this festival was more representative of Latino/Hispanic pride rather than remembrance of the Battle of Puebla. One woman I spoke to who wanted to remain anonymous said:

“Well i’m not Mexican, i’m Colombian. But I come here for the food, the music, it’s fun! There are people from everywhere here, it’s definitely not just Mexicans. Every time they have any festival, like the Colombian one it’s always a mix, everyone can come here.”

Though the festival was obviously Mexican to anyone who passes by and sees Mexican flags, signs in spanish, tacos, and the colors red white and green everywhere, it was really more of a blending of cultures. My mother’s criticism of the festival is that there’s “too much Columbian food.” There was food there that is Mexican and typical of Pubela: such as cemitas and tlacoyo, as well as regional Mexican food that is nowhere to be found in the city of Puebla: such as tacos al pastor. This goes to show that the festival creates a blend of the different cultures within Mexico, as well as between international cultures.

Introduction: As my portion of the project is almost 90% based upon legal policies regarding holidays (especially in the public school system), I think that it is appropriate to start at this website (http://www.senate.gov/reference/resources/pdf/Federal_Holidays.pdf), a PDF  of the CRS (Congressional Research Service) Report for Congress in 1999 regarding federal holidays.

Religious holidays in public schools: http://www.freedomforum.org/publications/first/findingcommonground/B08.Holidays.pdfwas a great source that I found that was sponsored by Jewish, Christian, and Islamic societies.  I will use this source to raise questions about what is the generally accepted standard in approaching religious holidays, as well as religion itself, in our public schools. I will also use this additional source written by Austin Cline, a former Regional Director for the Council for Secular Humanism, in outlining general reasoning for so-called “school” holidays: http://atheism.about.com/od/religioussymbolsholidays/a/schoolholidays_2.htm

Jewish holidays and their entrance into various public school systems as a day off: I will discuss reasons for why this was possible – such as population, political strength of the community in the specific geographic region.

• Portland students’ request to their school board asking permission for days off: http://www.jewishreview.org/node/11966
• Redondo Beach, CA – Addition of Jewish holidays to the district’s list of non-school day holidays by the Redondo Beach Unified School District Board of Education: http://www.easyreadernews.com/1166/jewish-holidays-added-to-school-calendar/
• Chagrin Falls, Ohio – Interesting approach by the school board, as they keep one of the two High Holy days as a school day, and the other a non-school day: http://www.chagrinvalleytimes.com/NC/0/220.html
• Most importantly, NYC – NY Times Blog on the scheduling controversy of the Jewish holiday closings in the academic year of 2010: http://cityroom.blogs.nytimes.com/2010/03/16/back-to-school-and-right-back-on-vacation/.  There is a huge lack of sources available online as to the exact reasons why Jewish holidays became official no-school days in NYC, so I’m going to try and obtain information from the NYC DOE.  I sent an email inquiry, so I am waiting for more information there.

Muslim holidays and the controversy of Bloomberg: As I did for the Jewish holidays, I will discuss reasons for why this was possible  in certain areas –  and see if the same reasons pertain to NYC.  If they do (and some of the reasons do), I would raise questions about why Mayor Bloomberg denied the request for the closings in 2009 – whether it was valid/acceptable for him to do so.

• Cambridge, MA – Recently implemented policies, starting with the 2011-2012 school year: http://www.boston.com/news/education/k_12/articles/2010/10/10/school_system_to_get_muslim_holiday/?page=2
• Article on Cambridge that details the closings in Michigan and Vermont as well: http://american3p.org/establishment-news/cambridge-ma-school-latest-to-introduce-muslim-holidays-2/
• Daily News on Bloomberg: http://articles.nydailynews.com/2009-07-01/local/17928149_1_muslim-holidays-mayor-bloomberg-eid-al-adha
• Renee’s article from the NY Times: http://www.nytimes.com/2009/07/01/nyregion/01muslim.html
• Op-Ed CNN piece on why schools should be closed on Muslim holidays: http://religion.blogs.cnn.com/2010/07/01/my-take-new-yorks-schools-should-observe-muslim-holidays/

Closing – Title VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964. I want to incorporate this into some part; I have a general idea, but I’m not completely sure yet.  I think it is an important thing to consider, especially if I am going to present my ideas from an unbiased, legal perspective:  http://www.eeoc.gov/laws/statutes/titlevii.cfm

Mother’s Day outline

• History of Mother’s Day in the United States
• Observation of Mother’s Day in China, Korea, Japan, India and Mexico

China : http://english.peopledaily.com.cn/200105/14/eng20010514_69871.html

http://www.chinadaily.com.cn/ezine/2007-05/16/content_873529.htm

Mexico: http://www.dayformothers.com/around-the-world/mexico.html

India:   http://www.dayformothers.com/around-the-world/india.html

Japan: http://www.dayformothers.com/around-the-world/mothers-day-in-japan.html

• Comparison between the celebration in the US and in their original countries
• Interviews from various countries: China, Mexico, Korea, Japan and more

• Woman’s rights
• Mother-child relationship/ maternal relationship – Tiger Mom http://www.nytimes.com/2011/01/20/books/20book.html?scp=1&sq=tiger%20mom&st=cse

• Commercialization of Mother’s Day – Hallmark Holiday? http://www.canada.com/vancouversun/news/story.html?id=c942370c-cdbb-43b2-af59-71ad4b546854

http://www.restaurant.org/pressroom/pressrelease/?id=1248

Comment Please! Let me know if you can help me out with the interview

Brief Outline

• History of the Holiday (Origins, Fluctuating Date, Religious Aspect)
• Brief description of how different cultures celebrate in their original countries
• Cultures in America (Not certain of the groups but have asked for information from Greeks, Italians, Hispanics, Romanians, and Polish so far, in addition to my German heritage)
• Commercialization of Easter

Preliminary Interviewing

• Greece

“well, the most important aspect of easter has to be going to church and celebrating the resurrection of Christ in such a traditional way. I went to church all week for like 3 hrs a night lol it really is mad important. During holy week, there is a strict fast, cant eat meat or dairy or that much food whatsoever. On holy friday, the whole church community walks around the block that the church lies on to symbolize Jesus walking with the cross to the place where he was crucified. On holy saturday, when we actually celebrate the resurection, everyone lights candles and says “Xristos Anesti” to one another with a response of “Alithos Anesti” meaning “Christ Has Risen” and “Truly he has risen”(Very important tradition that you should def add). On Easter sunday, you’re allowed to eat everything and their is mad food: lamb on a spit (staple of culture lol), spanakopita mousaka, feta, chicken, pita, olives, etc  Theres a basket of eggs, everyone picks one, crack them with each other, and whoever’s egg lasts the longest and doesn’t crack, i guess you’re lucky. its kinda like winning the lottery, on a wayyyy smaller scale.”

• Poland 1

Polish Basket Example

“On saturday, we go to church for a quick service to bless our baskets. each family usually brings a basket to church so that the priest blesses it. each basket should have: babka (this polish cake thing), butter, eggs, polish sausage,bread, a lamb statue made out of sugar, salt/pepper, and ham. the baskets are usually decorated with colorful laces and have little chicks inside and green twigs on the sides. in my parish, there are services every 30 minutes throughout holy saturday where the priest blesses the baskets. its tradition that you dont eat before going to church that day and when you get home, you have a meal based on the things you bless.
On sunday, we go to one of our family members house for a days worth of eating

Interviewee and Family on Easter

and drinking. its our tradition to go to the 9am mass at my parish and then go to the family members house afterwards. we stay there for the entire day. we start the meal witha prayer and then we first eat zurek, which is called sour rye soup in english as google tells me, and we put the food we got blessed the day before in it. after that, theres just a lot of food and it varies from meats to fish to random stuff i dont even know the name of, and lots and lots of drinking.”

• Poland 2

“Ash Wednesday starts the fasting period… and every Friday we cannot eat meat … and some families like mine don’t eat meat on Wednesdays either… then right before easter, we go to confession to get rid of our sins… then once Holy Week comes, easter cooking starts… you prepare a variety of meals… goodness there are so many that I don’t even know where to start….
there’s a Polish soup called Zurek (aka white borscht in english)
there’s white kielbasa, jajka faszerowane (stuffed hard cooked eggs), veal, kotlety, salatka jarzynowa (polish vegetable salad with things like eggs, apples, carrots, cucumbers, mayo, mustard etc), kielbasa, babka (a type of cake), eggs, different homemade meats, ummmm I can’t think of other things at the moment..
Then on Holy Thursday you go to mass… same with Holy Friday and Holy Saturday.. but on Holy Saturday before the vigil mass, we go to bless our easter baskets..
Then on Easter Sunday my family and I usually go to the Resurrection mass which is at 6 am and there’s a procession aroung the block with bells ringing and stuff. We come home and then have a family breakfast with the food that was in the blessed easter basket… then later on we have dinner and we eat all the stuff prepared earlier in the week…mainly lots of meat since we fast from meat usually from Wednesday (though not everyone does that)”

• Peru and Chile

“In Peru it isn’t celebrated like it is here. There are no bunnies or big dinners. My mom would just receive a chocolate egg from my grandfather and inside would be a surprise.
In Chile my dad would do a huge egg hunt with all the kids on the block in the mornings and they would celebrate by finding them and eating all the candy inside. There were also no big family gatherings or anything either.
My mom just said in America it’s much more exaggerated than it is over there. Sadly, I was raised as an American so my traditions are the same as the American traditions”

• Dominican Republic

“we go to church everyday during holy week. A mass that is geared especially towards that day and how it was recorded in the bible. on easter sunday you have to go to church with the nicest clothes you own. after we have a big lunch. nothing special just a lot of food. enough that it lasts to dinner time. then we just spend time together. In my family we invite as far as all my aunts and uncles and all my cousins. spanish familys are huge. like in mine 8 brothers and sisters and about 25 cousins”

• Dominican Republic and Ecuador

“I mean to be honest with you it really depends on the family, the circumstances…living in an american household obviously we went through the whole charade of the easter bunny and all that…but the holiday was really more about the superficialities, to us kids anyway, as opposed to the religion. sure I went to catholic school and learned about holy thursday, good friday, holy saturday, and easter sunday, but even the masses on each of those days lost a little bit of their meaning; I think the kids in my family got more excited about the pretty new dresses they were going to wear, and the easter egg hunts they got to embark on afterwards.
As far as DR I did spend an easter there. I don’t know that there was that much of a difference, though as to whether that was the culture or the fact that I was coming to visit as a child with the american ideology if easter in my head I’m not entirely sure…but things were more or less the same, I got a pretty dress to wear, the neighborhood kids came over to hunt for eggs in the backyard…but the once perceptible difference I remember is that it was more family oriented. Yea I went through all the American motions of easter, but it wasn’t normally something that my grandmother did, not having kids of her own there to buy easter egg dying kits for. So it meant more to me, and I guess it gave me a different kind of easter experience, one that was more centered around family, community. Community especially because my grandfather had a lot of land, and was one of the wealthier residents within the neighborhood, and the easter egg hunt that my grandmother organized consisted of the neighborhood kids that weren’t as fortunate, the ones whose windows had bars on them because they couldn’t afford walls to keep out criminals…as odd as that sounds. In the end though it was that sense of community and family that I think differed when I went to the DR for easter…religion obviously factored into that as well, you know my grandmother and how important religion was to her, so we went to mass as well…but even that was different; we all sang these fun upbeat songs together, everyone within the church knew each other, they were all old friends. But overall I think it really just was a lottt more centered around a time for everyone to come together rather than just games and fun and pretty dresses.”

Research

• Website with information on “The History of Easter,” “Why Does Easter’s Date Change?,” “Where Did the Easter Bunny Come From?,” “The History Behind Easter Eggs,” and “Easter Traditions Around the World”
• Website with a complete list of over 50 countries and how they celebrate the holiday
• Article dedicated on the commercialization of Easter
• Information regarding the origins of the holiday
• The History of the Easter Egg
• Information on the history of the holiday
• Brief information on how the holiday is celebrated in the United States
• Baruch database article on the history of Easter
• NY Times Article: “Easter’s Coats of Many Colors; The Nuances of Culture Reflect the Ritual of Rebirth”

Comments Please!

Please comment on my post to offer critiques and suggestions. Also, if your family has a tradition, pertaining to your ethnicity, that you would like to share, please feel free to comment and let me know.