Enterprising Chinese

Today's Word

 

Word Alive

Enterprising Chinese

By FR. BEL R. SAN LUIS, SVD

January 21, 2012, 10:50pm

 

MANILA, Philippines — Tomorrow, January 23, is New Year in the Chinese lunar calendar. The customary greeting is “Kung Hei Fat Choy!” or “Kiong Hee Huat Chai!”

The late Fr. Peter Tsao, SVD, former parish priest of St. Jude Shrine, San Miguel, Manila, told me that’s a greeting of wish for prosperity.

The “tikoy” (glutinous rice cake), which is traditional fare on Chinese New Year, symbolizes happiness because of the sweet taste and close family ties because of its stickiness.

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The most striking characteristic of Chinese is the way they do work. This is often called the “Confucian work ethic” – a certain discipline, a certain responsibility and value for hard work. Of course, other nationalities have this characteristic but it is a more common feature among the Chinese. This work ethic is instilled in the family by the father.

However, it’s been noted that the father is too busy with work that he has no longer time for the spouse and children.

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SUPERSTITIOUS BELIEFS. In his article entitled “The Gifts We Bear, The Roads We Tread,” Fr. Johnny Go, SJ writes the widespread belief of Chinese in superstitions and feng shui. He writes: “Whether we know it or not, whether we like it or not, the effect of superstitions on us is fear. We do all these things, we perform all these rituals, we make sure the dates are right, and the arrangement of my bed faces the east or north or whatever else our feng shui expert feels like telling us at that moment. Why?

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“Because we are afraid of doing the wrong thing. And the effect could be a misfortune, financial loss, a bad marriage, or bad luck. Superstitions make us slaves to fear.”

Fr. Go goes on to say that if we insist on believing in superstitions, then we are not believing the God Jesus Christ revealed to us. And that God is One who loves us in spite of our failures, misfortunes, and sins. He is not a God of fear but of love.

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I’ve known a good number of Filipino Chinese  and I must confess that most of these, especially the women, are very generous, thoughtful and deeply religious.

When assigned at the Shrine of St. Jude in San Miguel, Manila, I couldn’t help admiring the Catholic Women’s League there for their outreach projects.

What’s laudable is their perseverance as opposed to ningas cogon. They have been doing all these for the past decades and on a regular basis.

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Then there’s one elderly Tsinoy who for the past 20 years had been generously donating cash for our poor seminarians scholarship fund and other charity projects. Surprisingly, for all those many years, he never revealed to me his name or address.

KUNG HEI FAT CHOY!

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HUMOR. On the enterprising spirit of the Chinese, there’s a Tsinoy who went up to heaven. Having heard about the burning place called hell, the Chinese asked St. Peter for permission to go there.

St. Peter asked why. He replied: “I want to sell ice candy there, where it’s bely hot.”