La Familia

One Child Policy? Yes of course, I have one for each month of the year.

Cristina Yang, much as I love her, is not fulfilling much of the Asian Equation. Yes, she is a surgeon, yes she is the best, yes she has a characteristically hit-with-a-frying-pan flat face with epicanthic folds, BUT, she is lacking in a crucial area: the true Asian family life. For starters she’s married to someone who has red hair. More importantly though, she doesn’t want babies. Not even one. 

Babies. Babies and family are a key part of the Asian Equation, a key outcome. Instil a mafia-like loyalty to La Familia in your children and they too should form a faction of their own. Babies are so much a key part of the Asian Equation that China had to limit how many of them you could have because all the Chinese people were having children like cats and dogs. Asia composes 60% of the world’s population and India and China’s populations alone compose 37% of the world’s total number of people. That’s two countries making up 2.58 

billion people.

To have babies, honourably, you need a marriage. A good man (read: rich) from a good family with good genes (Asian) and a good job and a house preferably. Not too much to ask. All parents, after a point, will start to ask ‘when are you going to get married?’- for Fotoula Portokalos from My Big Fat Greek Wedding (hilarious film, with many Asian Equation elements, not to be confused with the terrible and frankly disturbing My Big Fat Gypsy Wedding), that age was 30. But, much like the age of career choice, the age of badgering about marriage begins prematurely in the Asian household.

The second generation of immigrant Asians (ie my brother and I) present a new problem with regards to the Asian family ideal not previously faced by parents wanting their children successfully married off. The problem of choice. In the native country, there are Asian boys and Asian girls to pick from. In London it’s a little different, a veritable smorgasbord of people to chose from. So the questions of ‘when are you getting married’ are modified to ‘when are you going to find a nice Chinese girl/boy?’. I have been said to resemble Dr. Cristina Yang from Grey’s Anatomy in personality (somewhere my brother is yelling YOU ARE CRISTINA YANG) and my choice in boyfriend has prompted my cousin to exclaim ‘how are you going to get that one past your parents? He doesn’t even have dark hair!’. However, as previously mentioned in this blog, I am a stubborn woman, and having seen the fair locks of my boyfriend, my parents gave up trying to push Chinese men on me pretty quickly. Having said that, it is always fun to say the words ‘I met this Chinese boy today…’ and see The Don’s face light up before following it with ‘he was really weird’.

My poor brother, having not yet fixed his sights on a pretty young thing, is therefore holding The Godfather’s last vestiges of hope for a thoroughbred family in his hands. It is with bated breath that La Familia awaits his decision.

And La Familia is not just my mum and dad. It’s the whole family. To some other cultures having the ‘whole family’ around for dinner might be a fairly non-significant affair. In Asian cultures, having the whole family around would involve some kind of warehouse. I have 9 first cousins (a small number by Asian standards); my blue-eyed boyfriend? Just 2. Second cousins and we’re looking at a figure somewhere in the 20s. A recent dinner involved half a restaurant, a frazzled Hong Kong owner who lost more hair with each passing minute, and more aunties than there are stars. And that was just my mum’s side.

But there are benefits to being in La Familia. Advice( since they are of course mostly professionals; from what to do with your finances to which painkillers to take), Protection and Endless Food.

So next time you’re thinking of breaking the heart of an Asian, just remember, if you mess with the pretty Asian girl you mess with the WHOLE family.