Lunar New Year

I should be reading for psychology and econ but instead, I am blogging. On Lunar New Year Eve, in the afternoon, I prayed for my grandmother and later in the evening, I headed to my uncle's house to pray for my great grandparents. My cousins and I played a game called "Game of Things" and it got very... disturbing? It's basically like "Scenes From a Hat" from Whose Lines is it Anyway. You draw a random card and on the card it has questions like "Things that make you go 'ahh'," "Things that you would not say to your grandmother," "Things that you wouldn't want to be allergic to," etc. and then the READER has to read everyone's answers out loud and everyone has to guess who wrote what. Unlike my cousins, I had to put "innocent" answers so in a way, it was easy for them to figure out which was mine. Lizzie, Jenn, Ivy, and "yall" might think, "What?! Lily? Innocent? Are you sure we're talking about the same person?" Anyway, that whole week, we went to my aunt's house and we did what any other Chinese family would do for Chinese New Year--eat and play cards!

I remember years ago we would spend Chinese New Year at my uncle's house in Solano (old house) and everyone would be in the living room. We'd sit in a circle playing cards and laughter echoed the whole room. The guys would be playing some kind of card game on the kitchen table and they would shout and scream (only because they were excited). All the kids would play eat, play cards, light firecrackers, throw pop-pops, etc. But now, those "kids" are in college (and some already graduated). This year's New Year seemed a bit... quiet and lonely. I like Lunar New Year because it's the only time the family could get together almost everyday for a week and just hang out.

This past weekend, I was at the Chinatown Lunar New Year Festival. On Saturday, I walked down with my brother and watched half of the parade (or maybe it was less than half) then I left by myself to the festival where I stopped by the YUCA booth. Then I walked around and saw Maggie helping out in the "Taste of Korea" tent and she asked me to go buy her food after I bought five bags of seaweed for myself. Hey, it was pretty cheap so why not? I asked Dennis and Trinh if they think they'll need a volunteer for Sunday second shift (since I need hours and I want to participate in the festival) to which they said sure (yes!). The stage for performers were super high! I spotted Yuqi, Lilly, Linda, and others watching "Legaci" performing so I stood with them and recorded the performance. They were really good! I looked around and spotted this guy watching the performance and girls went up to him to take pictures and such and I thought "hm, was he one of the performer?" and turns out he was. I didn't really know who he was but Steven mentioned his name and I checked him out on youtube and I love his covers.

The next day I got to volunteer. Trinh put me at the YUCA booth where I helped out with bracelet making and coloring. What was so cute is this little boy colored a drawing for me and Andy Le. After staying in that section for quite a while, someone from Taste of Korea asked Trinh for two volunteers and I volunteered to go because I was getting tired of staying in one place. Faith (another volunteer) and I followed her to the Taste of Korea tent and she explained that the two of us will be "bodyguards" for the Taste of Korea mascots (picture from top). At first, Faith and I thought WE were going to be the mascot, which would have been funny. Our job was to "talk" for the mascot. So when people would go up to take pictures with them and ask them question, WE have to answer for them and get those people to check out the Taste of Korea tent. We helped a lot of people take pictures with the mascots and even asked those hesitant people if they wanted to get a picture. I had a feeling they wanted to take a picture but didnt know if they could--I know that feeling--so I asked "would you like to take a picture with them?" And they quickly nodded and fished for their camera. Then I saw Nathan, Chris, and Phillip standing around so very stylish that they stood out (thats how I noticed them) and asked if they wanted to take a picture with the mascot. Either Nathan of Chris said "uh... sure" so I was waiting for them to take out their camera but they didn't have it with them. So one of them pointed to my camera and I said, "How am I suppose to send it to you?" And Chris said "Facebook!" So I took one of just the three of them and then I joined them (picture from top).

So after finishing up the "bodyguard" job, I returned to the YUCA booth and had to help out at the bracelet/coloring section again. I had no idea where the volunteers went because at one point it was only three volunteer left and then me. I was literally there alone at the YUCA tent. It went from about ten volunteer plus Dennis and Trinh to just me. After getting some slushie and crepe, Dennis and Trinh returned and was wondering where everyone went. Psh, well aren't they lucky to have me there (just kidding)? So it was 4PM and it was Jennifer Chung's time to perform. Since there were no kids at the bracelet/coloring table anymore, I asked Trinh if I could go get some pictures of Jennifer Chung and she said "sure" so I watched the performance for a while. After her performance, some YUCA people (so that's where you all went), went to take pictures with Seriously and Jennifer Chung. I popped out from behind the YUCA people and said hi to Jenn and told her "hey, I'm __'s cousin!" and she seemed surprise. "Oh my god, it's nice to meet you! I have to hug you" and I was thinking in my head "uh no... I have to hug you!" I never listened to her songs before except that day of the performance. One of her songs touched me and almost made me cry. After taking a picture with her and talking to her, I took pictures with Seriously. Then seeing that Chris and Joseph were wearing short sleeve, I asked if they were cold. Chris replied, "cool?" And I said, "no, cold." Then I realized he was joking when he said "cool? Yeah, I'm cool." And i responded with scoff, "you wish."

Anyway, my this is a long entry.