for the past 25 years of my life, ive never seen my dad shed a tear. but when his mom passed away, i finally saw him cry. a trip to new york that was intended for 2 people to share their vows, has turned into a trip where we said our last goodbyes to our grandmother. nonetheless, my cousin continued her wedding the next day after the funeral. due to superstition, we and other relatives on her side of the family were not able to attend the wedding. so our 6 days in new york were mostly spent in a buddhist temple where my grandmother prayed almost daily for 40 years. it was not until then that i learned about their religion and i learned a lot. from their chanting, to their praying, to their rituals etc, i had to partake in, in respect for my grandmother. even a high ranking monk flew in from the west coast just to pay his repects. a buddihist temple has always given me chills as i walk in for the first time. wall to wall, each side is lined with hundreds of small statues of old grumpy looking men and towards the front of the temple is this huge statue of a goddess with hundreds of arms and hands. i wouldnt know anyone who wouldnt be freaked out from this. for most of the 6 days, i was not allowed to eat meat or anything that was of living origin. what we ate were imitation meat, usually made from tofu or mushrooms. during one of the prayers, i had to recite hundreds of lines of prayer and kneel back and forth 108 times although i had no clue of what i was saying or doing. by the time the 6 hours of prayers were over, my clothes smelled like incense and my lungs were probably lined with incense only to know this had to be repeated the next day.
on the day of the actual funeral, about 10 private cars came to escort our whole party to the cemetary. it puzzled me how it would be possible to keep 10 cars together from downtown manhattan to upstate new york during rush hour? this is how they did it: when a light was turning yellow, the car that happens to be in the middle of the intersection would stop and block traffic from both sides of the oncoming traffic. it wasnt until the last car of the trail would pass and then the car would rejoin the funeral procession.
5 days in here
upstate new york in autumn is beautiful.
my dad said our only free day was on saturday. like 3 kids let loose in a candy store, me, my brother and sister were let loose in manhattan. from eating raw oysters, to sushi, to new york pizza, to ice skating, to shopping, we did it all. We walked from canal street all the way up to 57st (never again will i do that) and went up the empire state building. my brother, although 32 years old, still acts as if he was a teenager always picking on my sister. In the hotel room, he had to share a bed with my sister and all night long he would fart underneath the covers on purpose and my sister would complain. when im with them, sometimes it seems like we havent even grown up at all.
view from the park central hotel. (hey, thats where borat stayed!)
this is where young madonna worked.
on top of the empire state bldg
yum
setting up the tree at rockefeller
central park ice skating rink
