I’d like to wish everyone a happy and prosperous new year! Hopefully you rang in 2010 with the ones you love, high with emotions about the past decade and drowned with bottles of sparkling wine. I celebrated New Year’s Eve with my extended family, feasting on delicious dishes, playing with babies, watching home videos, and laughing with/at each other. My family, like many Filipino-American families, carried over some new year rituals from the Philippines. We clean (or try to clean) our house to rid of “bad spirits”. We leave coins on staircases and doorways to attract good fortune. At the stroke of midnight, coins and bills are thrown into the air turning into a rugby match over quarters, leaving someone with bruises or a broken finger. Chinese culture have influenced much of these rituals. The Chinese have been an integral part of Philippine culture in the spheres of business, trade, and even cuisine.
My mother is very adamant about one particular ritual related to food; she insists on placing round foods on every table in the house, usually fruits. Examples include apples, oranges, and grapes. In the Philippines, households put out 13 different types of round fruits that can include lychee, lanzones, calamansi, guavas, and other local fruits. Some families also like to display a big ball of cheese, known appropriately as a “queso de bola.” Most of the families in my neighborhood demand the brand Marca Piña.
queso de bola
I worked at my father’s Philippine grocery store during New Year’s Eve as a cashier. Throughout the day I watched customers scramble for round-shaped foods, and shell out $20 for a ball of cheese. Why? I had no idea. It was tradition. I asked both my father and aunt why we put round things on tables during new years. “Oh, well, it’s good luck.”
“But why is it good luck?”
“I don’t know really…everyone does it so I do to.”
This was not a sufficient answer. As the day went on I continued to ask customers why we took part in this tradition, but all gave an uncertain answer. Funny how over the years we hold on to traditions so tightly, yet we forget what they mean. Eventually I learned that the full shape of a round object represents wealth and prosperity. This was probably also a Chinese idea brought over to the Philippines. I can’t help but think of the deipction of a big, fat, happy, and round Buddha, the Chinese translation of the orinigal skinny, contemplative Indian Buddha.
So thanks China for making the Philippine New Year so festive. I do enjoy eating a plate full of oranges and clementines on Jan 1. Happy New Year!
i miss lucia’s food adventures