We started getting some rain lately, coffee trees respond to it with healthy green color. We sprayed the first round of Botanic Guard, and finished the first round of  sucker-ling. Another year’s routine works as coffee farmer in Kona.

There are always many stories to raise a child. As the child is growing, parents are learning with the child, not only about their child, but also about themselves. Today I’d like to share our story about how Sonny gets the concept of money.

I only used cash when I was in China, credit card wasn’t common way to purchase goods. Now more people use credit card than before, but most small business still prefer cash.

We visited my family when Sonny was 4 years old. One day, he was playing with other kids, a man who was selling steam buns came to the village. All of the kids ran to the man, stopped him on the road to buy sweet buns. My family’s backyard face to the road, about 100 yards, rice paddy between the house and the road. I saw Sonny was the last one standing in front of that man, one hand out for sweet bun, other kids left. He didn’t know, other kids got sweet buns because they gave money to the man. I took my wallet, walked to them. That man gave a sweet bun to Sonny before I got there, I thanked the man and bought few more. Since that incident, I often wonder how can we teach him what is money, what is it for.

Here, we use credit card most time, he doesn’t have many opportunity handling cash. So we started a saving account for his future education fund, tried to introduce saving concept to him. He only can spend the money if he goes to college or university, otherwise we’ll take it back. He didn’t get the concept, since he doesn’t have a chance to spend the money.

Last coffee season, Terry said to me,” It seems not fair to Sonny, since he can’t spend any money without our permit. We should let him keep his own saving, the money he earns, he can spend as he wishes.” Later we talked to him, he was excited about it.

He earned his first $9.00 from picking coffee, right way he spent $3.50 for a Hagan Das bar at a convenient store. When he had $20.00, he spent $17.00 for a toy rifle which he already had one at home. Both times we didn’t stop him, later he found that he didn’t have enough money to buy Mine craft book which he wanted so bad. Since then he thinks a little bit before he spend his money. It also motivated him to pick coffee willingly to earn some money, and he tried to find different ways to earn and save money.

His class had a field trip to Hilo, he convinced us to give him $10.00, he took another $10.00 from his own saving. If he didn’t spend all the money, he got to keep the rest. On that trip, he spent less than $10.00, so he made a few dollars. On February, his class had a two days field trip to Oahu, he took his own $20.00 and we gave him $20.00. He came home with two souvenir, an army helmet and a water bottle, cost $18.00, put the rest money back into his pig bank.

This year he wanted a computer for his birthday, we told him that he had to put in some money, at least $100.00. We’ll double the amount he put in, the more he put in, the better computer he’ll get. Our friend Tom gave Sonny many chances to earned money from him, he paid Sonny to play piano, five dollars for five songs.

He spent his spring break and weekend morning working with us, most time he moved branches and piled branches by drive way. Every day we asked him how much his work worth, he gave us a number, we looked the pile, gave him our price. Most times he got $3.00, few times got $5.00. He couldn’t do very much, but we let him do it alone, with his own pace, praised him for trying his best. I remember how boring it was, when I was helping my parents at his age. I shared my thoughts with him. We don’t always have a fun job or a job we like, sometimes we have a boring job, but we still need to try our best if we hold the job. In that way, when we have a good job, a fun job, we’ll cherish the opportunity and definitely do our best.

On his birthday, we picked him up from school, went to town, bought a computer for him. He used up his saving, $18.00 in debt to us, promised to pay back. He worked with us on Saturday morning, cut down his debt to $15.00. He lost one tooth, and asked tooth fairy ( Terry ) for $5.00. Terry handed the money to him, he handed the money to me right away, announced he was only $10.00 in debt. He received some money for his birthday, he’s not only debt free, but also some money in his piggy bank.

I can tell he’s very happy because he has power over his own money. He treated us with Hagan Das bars at special occasion, Terry’s birthday, our anniversary, Mother’s Day. I praised him for his generosity.

I’m happy, as a team, Terry and I found a way to open this door to Sonny. Wish he will enjoy the process of making money, spending money in good way, be the master of money, not be mastered by money.

Water Splash Festival is the most ceremonious traditional festival of the Dai minority, it takes place in mid-April after Qingming Festival. Usually three days celebration in Jinghong first, then other counties and villages have their celebration events. Today, with improved high way transportation and flight access, this festival attract many tourists every year, the whole city fill up with people, double up hotel room price, bring more business to restaurants or food booths.

My sister has some health issues, she checked in hospital to get fully check up, right after we buried mom’s ashes. It happened to be the festival time, so her two daughters and I stayed with her in hospital. There were three beds in her room and she was the only patient stay in there at night, so that room became our room.

First night of the festival, people gathered by Mekong river, let off Kongming lamp and river lamp. The hospital is near the river, we took my two nieces to see it, we also bought some Kongming lamps and let them off. It made of very thin rice paper and a wire ring on the base, a square of fuel. Light up the fuel, wait the hot air fill up the lamp then let it fly away.

View from hospital building

The next day morning, I took my nieces to see parade, it’s very colorful. If you ask me, is it the only time people dress up like these? The answer is no, you always can see people with their colorful clothes, except they are not usually in a big group like these.

The third day was the Water Splash day, from 10am to 5pm. On the street, people had bucket, basin, water scoop, water gun, splash water to each other. To Dai people, water is a symbol of sanctity, beauty and brightness. Splashing or dousing each other with water, is an expression of the desire for good luck and prosperity to that person, but now for most people, it became a good-nature fun festival.

When we were young, we waited by the road and splashed water to people passing by, used the water from the stream right by the road. I only had one time experience of spending Water Splashing Festival in the city.

At that time, I was working in a hotel, which was newly opened hotel, hired and trained most of young people. That day we gathered about 20 people, about 6 girls, rest were boys. We walked from the hotel to the center of the city where the main activity was held. Fire truck hauled water, drove around the city, provided water to people.  Wherever we went, people splashed water to us friendly, smaller group didn’t want to start a water fight with us. We girls were well protected by our group boys, we really had fun that day.

This time, only my sister and I with my two nieces, we didn’t even want to be in town. Sometimes people get carry away by their excitement, single or small group girls or women easily become a target, things can go really wrong. So we left the city and back to home in that morning.

Beginning of April is Qingming Festival in China, also known as Tomb-Sweeping Day. This tradition has a long history, has become a festival for the Chinese people to commemorate their ancestors. It’s an opportunity to remember and honor their ancestors at grave sites; sweep tomb, offer food, tea and wine to the deceased members, to pay their respect. I went back to China and spent a month for this festival, as my families were waiting for me, so we can bury my mom’s ashes together.

I arrived there 10 days earlier before the festival, so we had time to prepare for this big event.

First time, the whole family got together discussing about the coming event, we got into an argument since we had different opinions, ended up my brother left. In Chinese family, usually the eldest son plays a big part of taking care of their aging parents, and in charge of their parents’ funeral and Qingming event. In my family, my mom lived with my younger sister, my sister arranged my mom’s funeral. We didn’t expect my brother will change after mom past away, we believe we can do it and do it good. Our love toward to our mom won’t die, it will live in our heart until we reach the end of our own life.

What we learned from the argument was that, we realized my brother-in-laws, my brother and us girls couldn’t reach to an agreement. Chinese from different areas have different customs for same festival or events, my two brother-in-laws are from different part of the country. My family is not a Han Chinese family, but we are living in a Han Chinese community. We grew up with Han people, lost our own traditions and customs, tried to imitate their customs at their festivals, but we don’t have the same culture background and root. When my father past away, he was buried here by the people from this community with their custom. My brother participated the ceremony and knows how it went, we girls don’t know about it at all.

Next day, my sister and I went to a place where sells curving tomb stone. Mr. Miao who owns the business is a very nice man, he has been doing this business for over 20 years, has lots of experience and knowledge. He spent 3 hours to talk to us, found out my family’s situation, and offered his time and his workers to do the whole thing for us. He picked the best day for the event according my parents and all of us siblings’ Zodiac. Getting into an argument or fight at the ceremony are not a good thing, hiring a professional crew seems like the best choice to prevent disagreement, so we hired his crew.

There is another reason why we chose Mr.Miao. Three nights before we met him, my sister had a dream. In the dream, we were moving new furniture into our parents house, not a new house, but was remodeled house. The steps were going under the ground, someone fell and his face began to change every second. My sister was scared, suddenly a man’s voice said: ” Don’t worry, I can do this for you. I’ll tell you what you need to prepare, 7 yard of red cloth ……” My sister woke up before the man told her everything.

When we met Mr. Miao the first time, we told him our family’s situation, he said the exactly same words in same order, 7 yards of red cloth was on the top list of preparing items. We would like to believe that her dream foretold the future, and guided us to the right decision.

The stone was 5cm thick, 50 × 100 cm rectangular. edited the text and printed it out on a sheet, pasted the sheet on stone, then curved. Writing in vertical order, my parents’ names are in the center, their date of birth and death on the left side, their children’ name are on the top row of right side, daughter-in-law and son-in-law’s name are on the next row, then their grandchildren’ name are at the bottom row. Curved heavy stone frame supported this tomb stone, like a main entrance of a fancy old style of Chinese house. On the top stone of the frame, curved dragon on the left and phoenix on the right. An antithetical couplet curved on the frame of stone.

8,000yuan was his price, it paid for the tomb stone, and he provided materials for this project, like sand, cement, bricks and his workers. His crew moved all of the materials to the grave site, knocked down the old cement tomb stone; opened the right side of the tomb, put my mom’s ashes container into the tomb which was a space built with bricks; topped with another small piece of rectangular stone and covered it with dirt. As family members, we were not suppose to do these things on that day, only none family members could do it. We lighted fireworks, incense, burned joss paper, kowkow when Mr.Miao told us to do. It took the whole day, from 7:00am to 5:30pm. In between these time, we went back to home, cooked lunch and took the meal to the working crew; cooked offering food and held an offering ceremony after the crew finished the work; then prepared supper at the end.

It was a good day, everything went very well, rained after we finished the ceremony. We all pleased by Mr. Miao and his crew’s work,  paid him and gave red envelops to every worker. Thanked them sincerely.

We sisters are very close, I really enjoyed the time with them, so comfortable and relax when we were together. They told me more about mom before she fell. A few months before she past away, she divided her silver which were the only valuable things she possessed. She told my sisters, let my brother to keep her three pieces of old furniture if he wants, she had them since she married. All the things she did and said seems like, that she was preparing to leave, she took care of all of her personal things. Hearing all of these things about her, my tears burst out like water from broken dam, couldn’t stop. I felt sad because I couldn’t be there for her at the end of her life.

My sisters also told me that my uncle’s  death (my dad’s younger brother) might be the trigger of my mom’s fall. In that morning a relative came to visit, told mom that my uncle died 10 days ago, in the afternoon my mom ended up in hospital. After mom past away, nobody told her elder sister about it, tried to hide the news from her. But she over heard it from other people’s conversation, someone saw her sitting in a corner alone and crying. Next day my aunt fell, the same way like my mom. She past away 25 days later after my mom’s death.

My parents generation of my family became past, now we are the eldest generation in the family, another younger generation are growing and they bring hope and happiness into our life. Looking into our life, it’s a combination of sadness and happiness.

We hold gratitude toward to our parents for raising and loving us in their own way, remember their love and try our best to give our love to younger generation. It’s like a circle, no matter how many rounds it goes, love always there, continue to exist and never die.