YEAR OF THE WOOD SNAKE?

February 1, 2025 Opinion

I don’t do valentines, so I’d rather write about the forth-coming year of the Wood Snake, the Chinese New Year which is one of the biggest holidays in China, its “province”-Pilipinas and elsewhere in the world where they make their presence felt. The Wood Snake is charming, intelligent, and creative but also secretive, cunning, and sometimes ruthless. Dami nyan sa Malacanang, that is why they call it a “snake” pit! The good news is that the Wood Snake is nonvenomous, weakly venomous and does not bite when picked up by humans, unlike other humans who bite even their closest friend or family just to get ahead in this world! Hugot as useless!

The happy Festival is back and tomorrow, we have the grand parades and the usual big celebration at the Hotel
Supreme of Peter Ng. The excitement of the roaring drums, firecrackers, the dragon and lion dances and even “tikoy” are back and we join our Chinese and Tsinoy friends in praying for a brighter, better future ahead! In the more than
generations of friendship with Chi Jian Li, Chung Loy, Willy O., Fernando Tiong, Danny Chan and countless more,
although a candidate with Chinese sounding name was never my friend. I have been to China for the same number of
times or even more and have seen it all-including grand celebrations welcoming-new-year-booze, plenty of food and joyous celebrations.

Thus the culture, and the practices have seemingly been ingrained in me and sometimes I wonder if I was reincarnated from my previous life of being a “Chek-wa” which is slang of Chinese-“Intsik” which is not derogatory at
all. Reminds me of Erap who arrived in his hotel to book and the receptionist asked “Check-in?” Erap replied no,
“Noy-pi.” What could be worse is what children and sometimes adults who shout out to their tsinoy playmates, “intsik beho tulo laway.” In Trancoville we use to have our own Chinatown where Manang Atty. Tita and her brother SLuBhs Batchmate Ralph Leung stayed. They were treated with respect and affection.

Earlier on another Chinese Bff Pemoel “Boy” Ng, son of Ng Pee, founder of Bell Church and brother to the late ‘bishop” Elias Ng was the source of my limited mandarin like “Sakwa” or crazy, “Wan-su-tan-aw or “utak lamok”
(explanation: liit na nga ng lamok, paano pa kaya ung utak nya?). I was of course taught how to count “Ee, èr, san, suh, wu, liù, qi, ba, jiu.“. Then there was the cursing or swearing like “bèn dàn” or when you desire to call someone a moron, an idiot or a polite “ not so smart.” Wo kào which refers to your rear, behind, butt and swears “holy s_ _t!”

And since we are celebrating the year of the Wooden Snake let me give you my two cents worth of my own version of the serpent’s wisdom especially this coming May’election – “Better to be with the devil you know than the devil you do not know!” Finally in 2019, I was given a Chinese name by David’s business associates in Shanghai when we were
negotiating to buy Cable Cars- “Wen ya la” – Avila ????. This was my Mandarin name and if ever you received my business card, the name ???? in chinese characters is embedded at the back portion.

The first character or syllable is my family name and the second is the first name. Most chinese don’t have an “R”, hence the conversion to “L”. Example “illevocable” which means “not able to be changed, reversed, final.” Then again, only in the Pilipins can the “illevocable” be conditioned by the acceptance of the emperor and not taken face value, drama drama lang pag me time! Tao lang po! The Chinese, at least those I have dealt with are a funny lot and have a keen sense of humor when they are not counting their “Yu-ans or dollars”. Thus In Shanghai, a taxi passenger tapped the shoulder of the driver to ask him a question.

The driver screamed, lost control of the car, nearly hit a bus, went up the sidewalk and stopped inches away from a shopping window. For a few minutes, silence inside the taxi. Then the driver told the passenger (as translated by David in tagalog) ” Huwag mo na ulit yun a. Tinakot mo ako ng husto!” The passenger replied ” Bakit naman. Hindi ko akalain na matatakot ka ng husto”. The driver answered ” Sorry a, hindi mo kasalan. Ngayon ay unang araw ko sa pag drive ng taxi, dati kasi ako driver ng punenarya! Then a Chinaman goes to the eye doctor.

After the exam the doctor said, “I know why you’re having trouble.” The Chinaman says, “Why?” Doctor said, “You have a cataract.” Chinaman says, “No, I have a Lincoln Continental.” And the classic question of a CNN reporter to Mao-tse-tung- “when was your last election?” which was promptly answered by the Chairman “just befo blekfast!!!”
Nobody said we should not have fun so we join them in saying “Xin Nián Kuài Lè” – Happy New Year and Gong Xi
Fa Cái – “Best wishes, wishing you prosperity and wealth” Gong Xi! Hsieh hsieh Sigh.