Elissa’s Great Northern Adventures, part ii, or, “What If Your Great Grandmother Thinks You Married a Pagan?”

I thought the visit was going so well. G-grandma and I seemed to have bonded; once I located a voice pitch which agreed with her hearing aid, we played gin, discussed Ukranian egg painting, and hashed out assorted family ethnic backgrounds.

And then, then came Christmas Eve.

On Sunday evening we all sat down to a traditional, Ukranian Christmas Eve dinner. Following Russian Orthodox tradition, the multi-course affair was meatless, consisting mostly of soups, perogies, and breads. There was hay under the tablecloth to remind us of the stable, a braided ring of bread to remind us of the Trinity, and a raw clove of garlic chased with honey to remind us of sin’s sting and redemption’s sweetness. G-grandma and I were on opposite ends of the table, but as dinner wound down she called down to me, “So, do the Japanese have any Christmas traditions?”

I knew from the beginning that this would be a hard one to win. “No,” I yelled back, non-commitedly, “not really.” G-grandma raised an eyebrow behind her thick, round glasses. “Why not?” she demanded, “Don’t they celebrate Christmas?” Since broad generalizations seemed to be the preferred mode of conversation, I offered, lamely, “Well, many of them don’t, actually.” Her brow furrowed in disapproval.

“You mean they don’t believe in Jesus?”

I shrank down a little in my chair. If G-grandma could have heard a small voice I would have employed it at this point. However, due to aural limitations, I reluctantly shouted back, “Um, no, a lot of Japanese people don’t believe in Jesus. They don’t have a Christian tradition.” G-grandma eyed me warily, “humph”-ed, and returned her attention to the sauerkraut perogies on her plate. This was hardly an encouraging way to end the conversation, but I felt incapable of nuancing the idea of traditional religion at such a high decibel level.

A few hours later, once dinner was over and card games had resumed, Noel’s second cousin, Jessie, came over laughing quietly. G-Grandma, concerned for my salvation and Noel’s wisdom, had interrogated Jessie, asking her if I did or did not believe in Jesus. Jessie quickly assured G-grandma that, despite my Japanese roots, I was indeed a Christian and, to seal the deal, my father was a pastor. Unwilling to leave any stone unturned, G-grandma asked, suspiciously, “What kind of pastor?” “Christian, Grandma.”

Thus dissuaded from the disturbing notion that her great grandson had married a nice pagan girl, G-grandma and I resumed our friendship. I think she may have even let me win in our next game of gin.

This entry was posted on Monday, January 8th, 2007 at 10:09 pm and is filed under Americana, Carefully Dramatized Life Accounts, Hapa. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.