{EDITOR’S NOTE}
“Tradition is not the worship of ashes,
but the preservation of fire”Gustav Mahler, composer and conductor
ASIAN Geographic can be found on board and
at the following locations:I am Teochew, and every year since my father was a teenager, grandma
would go to the wet market before the Dragon Boat Festival and jostle with
other grandmas to buy salted eggs, chestnuts, bamboo leaves and red beans.
Then she’d lug her haul back into our tiny kitchen and spend the following
days wrapping and steaming the world’s meatiest, most substantial sticky rice
dumplings, each the size of a fat grapefruit. Wars were had between siblings,
neighbours and in-laws over these pyramids of deliciousness.
I was 13 when grandma died, and her recipes with her. None of us had
learnt them; We always assumed she’d be there, doling out dumplings every
June, the same way you never expect a car accident to claim your cat on a
muggy Tuesday after breakfast. In the minds of her daughters, there was
always next year to request a demonstration and record the secret method.
Such complacency makes time seem kinder than she really is.
What is tradition? A people’s loving protection and willing maintenance of
ancient observances? With these efforts, rituals like fire wars (p74) can survive
the generations. Even the slightest renewal of interest in a past custom might
revive a fading subculture from the brink (p58). But this era’s theme seems
largely defined by the underdog tribe’s failure to resist bartering unique
heritage for a share in progress – meaning ways of life, like monkey hunting
(p80) and corpse care (p66), are pretty much doomed. Faced with social
exclusion and poverty, it is hard not to sympathise with these peoples.
Losing a dumpling recipe is hardly equal to losing a culture. But it suffers
from the same sense of bereavement. Traditional practices are a connection
to eras past, and enrich our world with their wonderful diversity. Each one we
lose, we forfeit to cold history – the same way that since her death, I can only
ever taste grandma’s dumplings in my mind.
PHOTO © TANYA SHARAPOVARACHEL GENEVIEVE CHIA
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