Michelle Lam
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There's a Place Called Kokomo
🕑 Added 2022-03-16 23:35:58 +0000 UTCSomething I appreciate my culture is the level of honor we have for our grandparents, even after they pass away. While it may sound morbid to some, we bow to the shrines placed in our homes for them, we drop food off at their graves multiple times a year, and we burn joss paper goods for them (which can range from paper money, paper homes, paper cars, etc.). This practice is observed by many Asian families, and my Chinese family definitely enjoys spoiling my grandparents with luxuries they may not have had in the living world, which kind of makes me feel sad. My grandparents all came from villages in Southern China / Hong Kong, and living in a cozy old house or tenement apartment in America was what fulfilled their biggest dreams. Sometimes I wished they were still around to show them how far our family has come, because it's really all thanks to the sacrifices they made for us. While funerals are sad, one way we cope with our sadness is burning joss paper money for them. We fold joss paper to symbolize gold, we buy paper mansions, paper 4K TV sets-- paper ANYTHING to burn and send to them in the afterlife. While I'm not exactly that religious, I just feel appreciative that there is a physical act of love we can show to our grandparents even when they're no longer with us.
