CNYII
As you may or may not remember from last month's article, I spent my first Chinese New Year at the rustic home of my Taiwanese friend's grandmother in the southern mountains of Taiwan. It was as memorable as it was educational. That's about as nicely as I can phrase it. It was memorably dismal, cold and boring and I learned that what some people regard as entertaining diversions are to me, neither.
The setting for this peculiar celebration was, at first, charming in its rusticity - a brick and tile farmhouse built in the traditional Chinese manner. The main, older part of the house had had two wings attached at right angles to semi-enclose a rough court-yard paved in concrete, gravel, chicken bones and decades of fire-cracker wrappers.
In a driving, frigid rain, my friend and I were greeted at the door by what appeared to be all three generations of his relatives clustered at the small double door. Their crowding and clamor effectively prohibited us for a few sodden moments from entering the primary living area. I could only think how much I wanted to be out from under the gutterless eave and get dry and warm.
Upon entering, I realized that thoughts of warmth would be all I could expect to have here. The place was unheated by anything other than huddling, bundled bodies and a couple of dim, dangling light bulbs. This small source of comfort was decidedly off-set by the damp, chill draft which came unabated through the open doors and windows. (For the Chinese, as I have observed, possess a nearly insatiable need for what they term 'fresh air' - a misnomer in my estimation as they seem to feel that any stirring of the air, no matter how befouled or sooty, is considered 'fresh', particularly so if the moving air is cool. By necessity, everyone dresses as if they were prepared to spend the night outdoors. Which, in effect, they are.) The walls were moist and seeping. What I had initially mistook as flocked wallpaper was in fact a coating of mold and lichen.
For several frantic minutes, everyone from toddlers to dodderers, each over the other, shouted various season's greetings, well-wishes, pleasantries, courtesies, inducements to sit, eat and drink, chides for our tardiness, and enquiries about yours truly as the sole representative of the Western World present at this affair, all at once and in at least three different dialects of Chinese. I swooned. No one noticed. The crush of bodies held me up. Hot tea splashed from a tiny ceramic cup thrust into my hand brought me round. The middle-aged man serving me appeared to pantomime either the felling of a large tree or the vivisection of a trussed up alligator. I nodded daftly, rattling off a string of 'hsei-hsei, hsei-hsei' (Thank you) for which I was greatly admired and complimented for my pronunciation. Thumbs up. Well done.
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