Chirotechnics

Sunday, October 04, 2009

My Big Fat Viet Funeral

The women are watching "My Big Fat Greek Wedding" tonight. I actually like that movie despite the lack of explosions, great one-liners, and hippies learning real life lessons.

I like that movie because it reminds me of mine and Zelda's constant opportunity to learn from one another. Zelda has been to a couple of Buddhist funerals. Now for the sake of full disclosure, I don't follow the tradition as well as I should. In fact, I have no fucking idea what to do. I do what is told of me. The monks know this and will motion to me to bow 3 times vs. bow 4 times vs. bow 10 times with 3 incense sticks or 2 or 4 or 6 or whatever.

But, there she was. Zelda did what she was instructed to. She impressed the hell out of my other relatives. One of my uncles said, "Jethro's wife has been studying our culture. Did you see her place her hair behind her ear before bowing? She knows how to show respect. " In actuality, she was just clearing her hair out of her face before showing respect.

When we heard this, we both looked at each other in complete amazement and said, "Of course." We're not going to say squat about it because now we have family credibility. sssshhhhhh!!!!!! It's a secret.