Chinese New Year in Hong Kong: A Confession
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| Great Stone Dragon at Pak Tai temple in Wan Chai, Hong Kong. |
As many of my readers know, MsCaroline has two children who are in their mid-to-late teens, which means they were born in the 1990s. What this means is that MsCaroline shares powerful memories with them of 1990s and early 2000s kid culture, which (in our case) includes(but is not limited to) Barney
As good parents, of course, MsCaroline and MrLogical
What this means is that MsCaroline was also deeply influenced by these films, and, during her recent trip to Hong Kong, was distressed to realize just to what extent this indoctrination had taken place.
Upon her arrival at the historic Pak Tai Temple in Wan Chai, in Hong Kong, MsCaroline (sadly) did not immediately think, "What a tremendous example of sculpture!" or, "It is truly an honor to be seeing this influential symbol that has influenced thousands of years of dynastic rule!"
No, MsCaroline looked at the carving and artistry above, and immediately thought of Eddie Murphy as the voice of Mushu in the 1998 Disney production of Mulan, and found herself muttering, "Go! Awaken the Great Stone Dragon!"
Sad, isn't it? But then, MsCaroline has never claimed to be the last word in culture. And she's 99% sure that she is not the only parent who's had this experience. At least she hopes not.
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Comments
It's pretty common in our house to hold up the cat ala "The Lion King" style and sing "It's the circle of life!"
I think you'd understand :)
(and wow! how cool to see!)
Rory was never really into Disney films much but he was a Mr Bean nut for a time and howled laughing when he saw the painting Whistler's Mother in Paris, remembering the film where Mr Bean destroyed the original.
We are also terribly common when we visit art galleries - we try and see if portraits look like people we know.
Emma - Oh, you poor thing. Those little guys are all over the elementary school here. (rolls eyes.)
NVG - HA! I never played it, but I'm sure that MrL and the boys would have appreciated it. Speaking of video games, there's some shooting game out there with a Russian character, and every time we run across Russians (usually in airports) they start quoting the Russian lines from the game to each other. Do they know what they're saying? No. Someday one of them will probably get punched by an offended Russian tourist.
Rory in Paris: parenting is a thankless task, isn't it? Try to instill some culture in a child, and he thinks about Mr Bean. (I would have laughed too!)
We do the same thing in art galleries - we're even worse when it comes to sculpture. We should be ashamed of ourselves.
My students equated everything with a Disney reference, and this was HIGH SCHOOL. It was worrisome, to be honest. Here were 15-16-17 year olds who were still infatuated with Disney stuff.
I wonder if it is uniquely American to commercialize so much of our culture: licensed characters are on everything, and even our history is co-opted by animated characters now.
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to put this information together. I once again find myself personally spending way too much time both reading and commenting.
But so what, it was still worth it!
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