Thursday, November 17, 2016

Historical Thanksgiving



A Historical Turkey Ride
 
For four centuries Thanksgiving has been a time to show appreciation of what bounty we have. The tradition began in the fall of  1621 when the Mayflower carried passengers from Plymouth, England in search of a new home. After a long and treacherous journey they finally settled in Massachusetts. 


Long before the settlers arrived the area was inhabited by many Native American nations, among them the Wampanoag. The natives who been there for a very long time knew how to live well off the land they hunted, fished, and harvested. Chief Massasoit, the Wamapnoag leader, offered to help the pilgrims learn how to use the land in exchange for mutual protection. And so the Thanksgiving feast tradition began with a  shared harvest celebration. 


Here are more facts about the history of this day of thanks:



1)    The famous “Pilgrim and Wampanoag” story featured in modern Thanksgiving narratives was excluded from earlier Thanksgiving legends, largely due to tensions between Indians and colonists.

2)    Held every year on the island of Alcatraz since 1975, “Unthanksgiving Day” commemorates the survival of Native Americans following the arrival and settlement of Europeans in the Americas.

3)    President Abraham Lincoln declared the last Thursday in November as a national day of Thanksgiving, and in 1941 Congress established it as a national holiday.

4)    The original Thanksgiving feast in 1621 occurred sometime between September 21 and November 1. It lasted three days and included 50 of the 112 pilgrims inhabitants and approximately 90 Wampanoag members. Their menu included berries, shellfish, boiled pumpkin, and deer.



We hope this year your Thanksgiving is filled with gratitude and joy.

Tuesday, November 15, 2016

Story Cloth Folk Art




Hmong Story Cloth

Storytelling is a way of life for most people. Our adventures become lessons that can help others. Storytelling takes many forms: oral, written, visual, and art. For the Hmong people, an Asian ethnic group that suffered severe reprisals as a result of alliances during the Vietnam War, storytelling is a told through story cloths. These folkloric renditions of fabric tell stories about the journey from their homeland farming villages to refugee camps in countries like ours.


The San Jose Museum of Quilts and Textiles is hosting an exhibit of these colorful and vibrant stories. “Hmong Story Cloths: Stitching a History”, which runs through January 15, 2017, reveals the ways women decided to record their daily lives. The cloth journals include mundane acts of collecting water and harvesting as well as the more dramatic events, including marriages, annual customs and more.

Originally the Hmong people lived in the Yellow River region of China. Political repression by the Chinese government pushed them into Northern Vietnam between 1790 and 1860. Eventually, they migrated to the mountainous areas of Laos, Burma, and Thailand where they lived and farmed successfully for about one hundred years.

Their story cloths, also known as "flower cloth" represent folk art traditions like those found in other ethnic minorities in China. Embroidered bold geometric designs in different patterns reflected geographical regions. For example, batik is more common among the Green Hmong. However, the mass exodus brought groups together and over time, some patterns have found their way from one group to another. And, some pieces now also incorporate American color and pattern preferences.

The colorful strips were originally applied to clothing but can now be found on pillows, blankets, and even as stand alone folk art pieces.

To learn more about folk art, click here. For details about the show, click here.
 




Monday, November 7, 2016

One Note At A Time




Folktales

One Note At A Time

I recently sat at one of several black wrought iron bistro tables that lined the pebbled sidewalk of “Coffee Street”.  The late October sun had been generous. Coffee drinkers, like sunflowers, sat outside turning their faces to the warm light. They basked in its summer-has-not-yet-left promise.



At the table next to me were two older men reminiscing about their respective careers. While I was not eavesdropping, I was able to hear an occasional partial sentence and noticed how even just a partial phrase conjured up the start of a folktale.



For example:



“When I was in Nigeria we didn’t worry about that…” said the light-haired man. 



Worried about what? What was he doing in Nigeria?  And, how did he handle the worry he did have?



Ever on the lookout for living folktales because I see them everywhere, I was tempted to lean over and tell them to preserve the folktales – life stories - they were telling one another.  Afraid that might be too cavalier, I said nothing. Instead I wondered if they even knew they were telling each other folktales.



Most people don’t.



That’s the rub. Especially because it takes literally only minutes at a time to preserve a folktale, to capture for all time a memorable moment. That moment then continues to exist long after we are no longer around to do the telling ourselves.



Anyone can make a quick laundry list of what they recall about a particular time, place, event, person or thing. Then, at a later time that person can go back and add more information to each bullet point. That’s how the list grows into sentences that can become paragraphs. The result could be a folktale; something families and friends could treasure for years to come.



It’s really that simple. So the next time you find yourself telling others about one of your life stories, see if you can find a few moments afterwards to jot down a few notes about that folktale-in-the-making.



You (and others) will be glad you did!

Want to learn more about writing folktales? Click here.