Qin-Qi! (Relatives!)

This post is probably an inaccurate description of my relations, but that doesn't seem to matter because however tenuous the relation, we're somehow relatives:

Today I met up with distant distant relatives; I think it goes like this: my mom's dad's distant cousin's child married a woman, whom I call Goy yi-yi, who is also a distant relative of my mom's, but has a different last name (Li as opposed to Rong, my mother's maiden name). Apparently the government moved Goy (Li) to the "Wang" village after a dam was constructed flooding her village, and the "Wang" village shunned her, and she asked my mom's family (Rong or the Wu's... my maternal grandmother's family) to get her out of China. My mom's family in the U.S. had a distant relative who was willing to marry Goy and thus bring her to the United States. They now live in New York City; Goy sells fruit on the streets.

Goy is close to my mom's family, she shows up at all of the family gatherings in NYC. She is an extremely generous person, despite what little has come her way. Goy's younger brother's wife is the younger sister of a woman who I am staying with her. So there you go. We're Qin-qi (relatives)!

I think I've complained here more than once how conservative and "closed off" the Chinese community is, just about anywhere. I'm not saying they aren't nice, but in general, they aren't the sort of people who will let acquaintances or even friends into their personal lives easily. I've found this insularity is both somewhat lessened and exacerbated within the diaspora. For instance, one family in Curitiba was extremely open to me, even after knowing me for just a couple hours. I'd hypothesize that it might have to do with the relatively small Chinese population in Curitiba -- to see another Chinese person was cause for great excitment. When I insisted on paying for a drink and they refused, they said "You're Chinese! Chinese people must help one another!"

On the other hand, in a big city like Sao Paulo, where there are many clans and subcommunities within the Chinese population here, people tend to be more suspicious. You can't just be "Chinese," you have to be "Li," "Wang," "Xie," and not only that, but from the right clan of Li Wang or Xie. Throw in the recent violence (and the likelihood of complicity within the Chinese community) against the Chinese, and everyone has slammed the door, and probably locked it, on the gringo-Chinese dude who popped out of nowhere with the funny accent. And the funny last name (Bien is extraordinarily rare... as is Rong, my mother's last name).

On the other hand, if you have Qin-qi, you're golden. Even if the relationship is as unclear as it is to them as it is to you, most Chinese people will treat you like a long-lost child/sibling.