i went down to san diego yesterday to visit my parents during my spring break as well as see my friends who are moving to spain next month. i was planning to hang out with my friends more than my parents because my parents are crazy asian parents.
when i got home, i had to use the restroom. all i had eaten before i arrived in san diego at 6:30pm was two granola bars and a large iced vanilla latte. yeah. i know.
when i got home, my mom wasn't at home, so i'm like "YES! PRIVACY!"
so i'm in the bathroom and i hear my mom, dad, AND strangers walking in the living room and chatting.
so i go out to the living room and i greet them. it is my mom's cousin by marriage. i remember the photos of her holding me when i was a newborn baby, but i haven't see her since. they live in the bay area. she's there with her husband, and two of their kids. they're down here cause the younger one is here to check out ucsd. she's a high school senior. and the other is 26 years old.
what is so important in this is that when my mom was escaping vietnam via a boat with her sister, this woman was also on the boat with them. so they share a momentous event during the traumatic point in their lives. that was pretty cool.
everyone my parents introduce to me think that they have to speak english with me because i apparently look way americanized. the aunt laughed as the uncle stutters upon each english word that he utters. he's more terrible at english than my dad and mom.
and she was like "just talk in vietnamese." and he's like "do you speak vietnamese?" and so i start speaking vietnamese and this happens each time... they realize that of my generation, i probably have the largest vietnamese vocabulary. i can't talk politics, but i can live in vietnam and not worry about anything. and so the rest of this continues in vietnamese.
so i cancel my plans with my friends who are moving to spain. i told them i'd hang out with them all day friday. my parents really want me to go to dinner with them.
during our talk before we head out to eat, the girls ask me how new york is like and the weather, and my life there. and then they asked if my life was anything like "sex and the city." EXCEPT they said... "BLANK and the city." and i was like, "what?" and then the older one whispers it to me. "sex! we're not allowed to say that word in front of our parents. especially my mom." and all i could think at that moment was "um, you're a goddam married 26 year old. grow some balls." but of course i said, "ummm, oh. okay."
i mean, i know. it's uncomfortable to talk sex with your parents, but if you're in a conversation with your peers, and your parents are having their own conversation, chill the fuck out. and i mean, i don't tell my parents about my sex life, but let. it. go. maybe my parents are more liberal. but trust, my parents are definitely right wingers. my mom is still a supporter of bush. to. this. day. but i guess it is different. i say "fuck. shit. goddam," etc with my parents. but that's because my parents have mouths like vietnamese sailors. i guess it's different because i cuss in english and they cuss in vietnamese and chinese.
so we finally leave for the restaurant and they're like "how do we decide who goes in what car?" and i said "young folks go in my car, old people in the other."
sounds like a good idea.
one thing that i got from that statement from the older sister is that 1. she's either totally playing the good daughter but is totally a slut. or 2. she's actually a goodie goodie because she believes that she is a goodie goodie... BUT she also has her crazy/weird streaks. so being the polite chauffeur, i asked them what kind of music the want to hear... and they're like "we like canto-pop."
canto-pop is cantonese pop songs. it's SO bad. i mean, unless you're into all time bubble gum knock offs of american pop, it's great. but NOT IN MY CAR. what irked me the most is that THEY DON'T EVEN SPEAK CANTONESE. WTF?
and then the older one say: "i've been listening to itunes a lot lately. there was a period when i was really into hoobastank." and then my autopilot mental judging began.
and she followed that up with: "i just discovered bjork. have you heard of her? oh. i love this new singer, beyonce. do you know who beyonce is?"
DO I KNOW WHO BEYONCE IS????
and then she goes... "oh. i also just started listening to janet jackson."
and then i uttered: "oh, i have janet's last album."
and then she uttered: "oh, you own her album??? i love track 11!"
this girl is 26. she's not that young. she was born in america. the bay area is NOT a rock.
so we get to the restaurant... and my dad does his usual smoozing. he shows off that he's done this and done that and that and knows this person and that person....
i am polite. i wipe all the tea cups, spoons, dishes.... the older one caught on and started pouring the tea.... it was like we were all in saigon 1932 and i was wearing a rice paddy hat.
somehow the conversation drifted to the parents living in vietnam. they started talking about ghosts. vietnamese people are super-superstitious. like, ubersticious. and we find out that my uncle is really really scared of cementaries and ghosts... and then he tells the story that ghosts that appear as beautiful women and then they seduce the men and suddenly, they vanish and the guy is left with a mouth full of sand.
what i wanted to say was: no. those guys were with hookers and then got robbed, too embarassed, and told everyone a ghost story instead.
and i said out loud, because for some reason, i started thinking that 1. i'm getting old. 2. i should be more mature. "those are stories that people tell to scare you. parents tell their kids these stories (equivalent to fairy tales in europe) to scare you into submission. and then the stories get passed around. mature response right?
and then the aunt goes "do you really think that?" and i said "YES."
and then while eating quail (or as i suggested, it was probably pigeon, which freaked my mom out...) my dad decides to tell a joke.
here's where the dilemma occurred. vietnamese adults born in vietnam, to the most point, are very prude. my mom and dad showed off to everyone that ang lee spoke at my college graduation. "ang lee!!!! he spoke at the graduation. he directed crouching tiger, hidden dragon! he's very famous!"
and when ang lee got all that hoopla for directing a gay cowboy movie, NOT A FUCKING PEEP OUT OF THEM ABOUT THAT. why? cause it's a taboo subject. you can say "seduce, sensuality..." but you cannot say "have sex." it's all alluded.
recently, there was this vietnamese girl who's on a show in vietnam. it's the equivalent to a wholesome hannah montana. she's a studious girl who is trying to resist daily temptations. she's a virgin and wholesome." anyways.. this girl, the actress, had an ex-boyfriend who studies in the states. anyways, he videotaped them having sex and then it leaked out onto the internet. like BIG time. (i saw it, it was soooo boring) she show was cancelled immediately. the vietnamese public began its mob mentality. they hate sexually active and provocative issues. give them melodramas about boozing husbands and almost falling in love with the maid who turns out to be his daughter or sister... as long as it doesn't actually happen..." that shite my parents eat up.
but if god forbid, a girl (actually i believe she was an adult) has sex outside in her own personal life... it's an equivalent to "lets kill her."
anyways, i was sitting with my mom when that news story broke out... and she's reading it in the newspaper, but she refuses to discuss it with me. she avoids it. and with that, if you avoid it, it will go away mentality is what irks me about her. but i can't change her generation. doesn't she realize vietnamese is the next asian country to have a major sex-trafficing issues? that means there are plenty of sexually promiscuous girls in vietnam. and i'm sure there are tons before the vietnam war, and there still is now.
anyways, but to the dinner conversation about the quails...
let me preface it with this. in vietnamese, there are slang words for genitalia. penises are called a word that doesn't really translate to anything i am aware of. it's like "dick." and vaginas, like america's version of "pussy" the vietnamese slang for vagina is "bird."
anyways.... here's when the shit hit the fan.
my dad's joke:
"what kind of bird has nipples/breasts?"
and i should have held my tongue.... but it all comes out of my mouth without missing a beat:
I SAID "A WOMAN."
i turned bright red immediately.
my aunt shrieks in laughter out of embarassment. i turned to my mom who has the visual defintion of MORTIFIED. and then she breaks out in a nervous laughter.
my dad is sorta oblivious cause he's too concerned with the answer.
he goes: "no, a bat! a bat is a bird that has nipples!" (the wholesome answer)
not neccessarily aware of my over the top sexual pun, my dad is defending his answer.
here's the other thing... my parents were educated in the fifties/sixties. they were educated in a third world country. it's totally logical to think that bats are birds. because they fly. but i've taken biology. bats and birds are not the same thing.
so i correct him. and he's like "if a bat isn't a type of bird, what is it?" and i said "it's a mammal, like us. they bear live young, hence the nipples."
he's in his own world and totally not believing me. i turn to the older girl who is sitting to my right and asked her and she too, quietly agrees.
i am still red and laughing under my breath because what i did is a huge faux-pas in vietnamese etiquette.
like, huge faux-pas.
my uncle sorta was laughing, but at that time, i definitely knew that i made a tacky mistake, however clever my response was. afterwards, they eat their watermelon dessert and we leave the restaurant.
we drive them to their hotel and we go home. no conversations about my wise ass answer.
so my relatives are in san diego at ucsd on friday. they were planning on going to the beach and relax and hang out and leave on sunday morning.
my parents, being who they are, insisted that they dine with them again (i am gone all friday with my friends). even though my parents know that they are here for only several days, they find it rude if you don't take them out to eat every night they're in town. it's good intentions.
so my parents decide to drive to the hotel today even though the relatives didn't answer their phone calls... their multiple repeated phone calls.
they go to the hotel and find out that my relatives have checked out of the hotel.
my dad calls me to find out if i have the daughter's mobile number. my response was basically "i've met her once. why would we trade numbers since we don't have anything in common and she lives in san francisco?"
apparently my dad had copied their number down wrong. his 0 and 9 were mixed up and also i'm sure he got some of the numbers wrong... or maybe they didn't want to hang out with my parents. one night is enough if i do say so myself.
an hour later i get a call from my mom. "your aunt hates me! and i hate her too! i don't know why she hates me, but i hate her!" so then i find out that my mom called them repeatedly for two hours and they didn't pick up the phone. so my parents headed out, find out that they checked out. my mom goes home, calls their home number and leave multiple messages. she then says "they're not returning their home messages!" and i was: "umm, if the kid's school orientation is in the afternoon, and it takes seven hours to drive up to the bay area, how are they supposed to get your message?" and of course she responds, "their other kids live with them!"
i told her that if i got a message for my parents, i wouldn't pick up the phone and would tell them once they got home that they have a message.
and then i said "maybe they don't want to hang out with you guys. maybe they want to be a family on their own and spend their own time together. it's their family. they can do whatever they want. why are you jumping to conclusions???"
she then cools down maybe half a degree and we get off the phone.
i start thinking that it was my faux-pas and that their family doesn't want to hang out with such trashy people. see how my mom's crazies start when i talk to her? she is the reason i feel any type of high-stress anxiety.
later that night, i called my dad to find out what the happened and if the whole situation was resolved. apparently the relatives finally called. they had some car trouble so they decided after the orientation to go home.
logical excuse. so i asked him if my mom is satisfied with that and he goes: "don't bring it up. she's still pissed."
and i of course go: "but that's a logical reason. why is she still pissed?"
and he goes: "um, that's your mom. she's pissed. i'd stay out of it."
and that is what happens when i hang out with my parents.
the end.
