yaawn...

tired. it's been a strange coupla days. tuesday was the funeral for my dad's nephew, Louie; he passed in the hospice on New Year's Eve. i know that i had identified Louie as a cousin of my dad, but he was actually a nephew!!! funny, that means, a man who was 49 years older than i, was my cousin! strange how timing works in some generations.

i guess it's not all that uncommon though. after all, my eldest brother, who is almost 22 years my senior, could have been married and had a child even before i was born - had he started early enough. hasn't everyone seen this scenario before, when an uncle/aunt is barely older (or even younger, in some cases) than a niece/nephew?

anyway, the service was at Fairmount (Cemetery)...and indoors. thank god! i couldn't imagine being outside for the burial. i remember when i was a pallbearer for a brother-in-law. that day was so windy...

i don't mean to dwell on this subject; i am the last person on this earth to be called 'morose.' it was just an eye-opening day. although i knew Louie's four sons, i had only met a couple of his grandchildren. i had no idea that Louie had ten grandchildren and seven great grandchildren! geez, my dad is a couple years older, had three more kids, yet has four less grandchildren, and no great grandkids.

another wild thing happened while we were milling around the waiting area. Lily, a cousin to Louie by marriage, arrived with two of her sons, Gordon and Eugene. wow! talk about surreal... i hadn't seen Lily's kids in twenty five years. Gordon is a couple years older...Eugene is the same age (33)...and Jerry is a couple years younger.

well, they looked the same as they did in 1978...just in adult bodies. we did catch up some, but it was a bit awkward because we were never in the same social circles.

now, by social circles, i don't mean high school cliques (since we attended different schools anyway), but tongs. Tongs?

no...not the kitchen/workshop tool used to pick up things, but chinese benevolent associations.

huh?

chinese benevolent associations are fraternal organizations that were established in the late 1800's in the USA. chinese immigrants, usually men without their wives/family, needed a place to gather where they could escape the racism and foreign-ness of a new land; where they could eat familiar foods...read chinese newspapers...gossip in a familiar language...even gamble. for them, it was an artificial (but comfortable) home-away-from-home.

in the Denver area, there are three tongs: Hip Sing, Hop Sing, and Bing Gong. from the 1920's until the 1970's, they were an intergral part of blue-collar chinese society. not only did new immigrants seek 'asylum' there, but they could also count on finding help regarding immigration/legal issues. benevolent associations were quite instrumental in the overall smooth transitioning of the 'fresh off the boat' arrivals; when things got tough, they went to bat for their chinese brothers.

Hip Sing, although not the oldest Tong in Denver, has the largest membership and is the 'club' to which my family belongs. in fact, my dad was appointed (in 1954) as the second president in the history of Denver Hip Sing, making him the John Adams of the United Tongs of Denver heh.

I think Hop Sing was the first to be established...in the 20's (as mentioned above)...when there was a Chinatown in Denver(!) unfortunately, there were race wars and it (along with Chinatown) was burned to the ground. They did re-establish themselves and had a small membership until the '90s.

Bing Gong i have little knowledge (of). i know that it has a much larger member base in other parts of the country; i think it's strong in NYC and Seattle. their Denver membership peaked in the fifties and sixties.

as a kid, i remember going to Chinese New Year parties at Hip Sing. the building is still there, on 238 Broadway. in fact, Hip Sing HQ in NYC owns that side of the block. anyway, i vividly recall the brown door, doorbell (you had to be buzzed in), and long grey carpeted stairway of the entrance. quite cold and boring...but once you got up the stairs and entered a swirling fog of cigarette smoke, past the sounds of the rattling dice and slamming dominoes of the pai gow tables, and through the door, into the dining room, everything was okay; all the winter cold outside simply dissipated.

unfortunately, the majority of the Denver chinese community leaders (in the last fifty years) has either passed or in the septua/octogenarian timeframes of their lives. there hasn't been a Tong new year's celebration in more than ten years. although the buildings are still around, they lie dormant. the newer chinese immigrants that have arrived in the US in the last 20 years are predominantly Mandarin-speaking (either from mainland or Taiwan) and are more educated, often here to attend graduate school or work for a large American corporation as consultants; very much a white collared work force.

they too have their clubs and associations with their respective parties and celebrations, but it's not the same. it's not because i'm 'old school' or anything...or because my parents have lived here since 1933 and 1947 (no 'we were here first' themes)...or even because they speak a different chinese dialect from mine. no, i just don't see them as genuine as the people i grew up around.

now, i'm sure that many of these immigrants have had hard times growing up in China/Taiwan; i'll freely admit to having an easy life growing up as a Chinese American...i know i have had numerous golden opportunities that they lacked. what really eats at me, though, is the sickeningly sugary fakeness that is grossly exhibited in whatever function i have attended with my parents. i just don't care to attend any of their functions.

last month, i attended a function that basically provided the straw to break my tolerance camel's back. it was the 6th anniversary for this chinese club...the party was in a restaurant...food was good, but weirdly fancy...and there was even beer on the table (old tong parties just had coke, 7up, and whiskey ;).

what nearly drove me up the wall was the fact that this prominent club had a keynote speaker...Dr. H*nry L** (got this idea from Cindi and Lowa). you know him. he's the famous forensic pathologist who helped with the OJ case. well, he was in town to help with the K*be Bry*ant case. nice man. brilliant man. fucking raging egomaniac...ugh. the man lives to be in the spotlight. gee, what a great way to celebrate a sixth anniversary...BARF! get over yerselves people... i bet it would have been cheaper to find an alternate form of entertainment.

and it's not like the man was there to talk about Chinese community and involvement in Denver. no, he stood up there for 90 minutes, pontificating on past cases he's handled and that law enforcement had bungled. some of the material, i believe, was done in poor taste. he was showing graphic slides of bodies and murder scenes that he was sent to investigate. granted, as someone who has worked with human remains, i thought they were cool ( i think Nelle would've liked 'em too, since we're both fascinated with true crime [especially mass murderer] stuff), but there were kids in the audience. and yet these parents won't let their kids even go to a PG-13 show. yeah, that makes a lotta sense. there were even gimmicks such as tossing out 'sheriff' badges to the dolts who answered the obscenely obvious questions he was peppering his adoring crowd. the 'speech', which had commenced after dinner, ended with him autographing copies of his new book. gawd, i was so pissed, i almost went Denny (heh) on them...grrrrr.

you know, instead of blowing five or ten grand on his speaking fee, why didn't all you tards just commemorate a shrine to the man at the entrance of the restaurant?!? what a friggin' buttkissfest.

so...now you know the 'chinese' definitions for 'tongs' and 'social circles.' and i even threw in a truncated history lesson of chinese immigrants in the Denver area. you can't get good shit like this in W*bst*r's or Br*ttan*ca!

bet you're the ones who are yawning now. hey, the mere thought of reading my blog could put N* D*z and V*var*n out of business...