I realized one thing when I was younger...that my memory is terrible. I need to start writing these stories down while they're fresh, otherwise they could be lost forever. Here's what my father just reiterated over our Roll N' Roaster lunch.
That guy that works in the restaurant who happens to be my father's "ghost-cousin"...
We were having a conversation about a dim sum place we recently attended and my father remembering it his "cousin" working there. By cousin, he meant that someone in our family and somebody in his family were married after death.
This is called a Ghost Marriage, in which two people are married after death so that they don't have to endure a lifetime of loneliness. According to wikipedia, Chinese ghost marriages were usually set up by the family of the deceased and performed for a number of reasons, including the marriage of an engaged couple before one member's death, to integrate an unmarried daughter into a patrilineage, to ensure the family line is continued, or to maintain that no younger brother is married before an elder brother.
My father's grandmother was stoned to death while using her arms to protect my grandfather, who was ACTUALLY previously married, but the Japanese attacked their house and she died.
So my great grandfather was a baller in the old days. He had two wives, certainly not uncommon, and he was brave enough to live with both of them under one roof.
The first wife bore him a daughter. At some point, he wed a second woman who gave him two sons and two daughters. The first wife would get into arguments with the second one but when it came down to it, the second one would remind her that she never bore great granddad a boy so she was kinda worthless.
The first wife grew depressed and so she hung herself. The village in which she lived was infuriated by this, it's a grave crime for the first wife to be driven to such an act, so they decided to stone the second wife.
My father painted this lovely visual of her being stoned while her children huddled beneath her protecting arms. And this would explain my father telling me how his father killed someone on the boat coming to America.
Apparently Grandpa was also previously married, but the Japanese attacked China in some war and a missile injured the first wife to the point where she wasn't able to recover and passed away. Then he traveled to America, was betrothed to my grandmother when she was 19 and whisked away from her family to join him in America.
My Uncle John's got 99 problems, some used to be women, but not any more.
On my mother's side...my Uncle came to America. Problem was, he was married and somehow managed to leave her in China. As he began to carve a new life for himself here, he met and fell in love with an American woman and married her...without getting a divorce to the first wife. I mean, an entire expanse of water separates the two of you so what's the chances...right?
Well the chances however slim weren't in his favor as the first wife found a way to come to America and was not happy about the situation she found. She fought tooth and nail for her spot in the family and eventually, creating so much calamity that my uncle and the second wife couldn't take it anymore and split.
After the divorce, the first wife got into a car accident in which she didn't survive...and then my Uncle John found himself back to where he started...alone. Perhaps he needs a ghost wife. Or maybe not.
My father and uncles got skipped through school for math, and I could have as well....because of that Great Uncle who passed his brain down the line!
My grandmother's great grandfather went to Beijing to take a nationwide exam, the kind that only one in twenty thousand people pass. Because he was one of the few, he was named a scholar which was one of the highest honors back in those days. Others who have passed this exam have progressed to become officials and other positions likewise. Instead, he returned to my grandmother's village of ten thousand (considered quite the size at the time) and enjoyed his new found notoriety. The school in the village named the playground after him and he later opened up a private school of his own. Back then only well off people could afford to attend school so this opened up a wonderful opportunity to those in the village at the time.
My grandmothers grandfather was also asked by Dr. Sun Yat San, the first president of China, to be on his cabinet when he first visited in the United States. He turned down this great honor because of his great great grandfather's allegiance to the Emperor.
My father and his brothers were all skipped through school from scoring high in math exams. When I was in school, I'd always finish the exams fifteen minutes before the next fastest person, because it was so easy for me. I barely had to write down my calculations and I consistently scored higher than 99.99th percentile in the nationwide regents exams. I would say it's not fair.
I'm not exactly sure why figuring out the bill when I eat lunch with my coworkers is so difficult, but I suppose if you don't use it, you lose it...even when you have generations of genetics trying to keep it up. Sigh.
Somewhere down the line, you're related to the Emperor and your last name isn't really Chin.
Supposedly five generations back we are related to one of the last Emperors of China...yet there is no actual proof of this. What would normally happen in a coup is the former family flees...or risk being hunted down and murdered by the new family. I suppose not killing them would be a security risk. If this is true, that means my ancestors changed their surname and hid...so perhaps "Chin" isn't my real last name after all.
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