Waking up at 7:30am on a Saturday, during a four-day weekend, is excruciatingly painful. As someone who could probably sleep through WWIII if it started and ended between 5am and 9am, I am not known as a morning person.
So when I rolled out of bed Feb. 13 at 7:30 a.m., it could only mean one of two things: Johnny Depp was bringing me breakfast, or CCTV’s New Year’s Gala was broadcasting. Since Mr. Depp doesn’t know I exist, the logical conclusion would be that I woke up, in spite of excruciating pain, to watch TV. But CCTV’s New Year’s Gala is not just the average television show. CCTV’s New Year’s Gala, commonly referred to as Zhōngguó zhōngyāng diànshìtái chūnjié liánhuān wǎnhuì, is the annual four and a half hour long Chinese New Year celebration, of the Lunar New Year, that 75 to 100 billion people tune into every year (making it the most-watched television broadcast in the world).
In China, the Gala starts around 7 p.m. and goes to 1 a.m. However, mankind insists upon this concept called the “time difference,” therefore proclaiming that 7pm in China is 6am in America. So I woke up at 6am and tried to watch the Gala. I only got far enough to turn on a light before the urge to sleep overpowered my willpower and I fell unconscious again.
But being persistent and motivated, I managed to get up at 7:30, and stumble into the living room where my parents were already watching the broadcast on the computer. Happily accepting a cup of warm tea, I pulled up a cushion and settled to watch magic unfold on the tiny screen.
Two familiar faces appeared, brilliantly garbed, and introduced the next program in clear mandarin. My ears perked up to the “strange” language. It was like culture shock; I was so used to English or Chinese with English words substituted for the ones I couldn’t remember, that to hear a complete dialogue in unbroken, fluent, Chinese, took me by surprise.
I was reminded of how far I actually was from my home in WuHan and how little Chinese culture I still retained. As the program went on with famous singers from different areas and different times creating beautiful melodies, with the familiar faces of the two xiang sheng (stand-up comedy in a way) performers, with the new twist on the continuation of the “Remodeling” skit, with the quirky magician who stuck his hand through glass, and with the dances that could make Anna Pavlova jealous, I felt like I was in another world.
As I grow older and more embedded into American society, I encounter Chinese and Chinese culture less and less. But sitting in front of the computer screen, at an ungodly hour, holding a cup of tea and surrounded by family, I felt completely connected to the distant culture of China. I found that I could still understand the jokes, could still appreciate the music, could still recognize the dances, and could still identify familiar faces (although not by name).
For four and a half hours, I was surrounded by reminders of who I am and where I came from. It’s an amazing feeling: finding something you didn’t know had slipped away. By the end, I was left with vivid images of dances and beautiful snippets of songs. I was also left with the déjà vu that I had felt like this before, that I had had these reflections once upon a time. That déjà vu is one of the things I like the most about tradition, the comfort in knowing that this event, these feelings have happened and will happen again.
Every year, around 10 a.m. when the Gala ends and my brain whines at the loss of precious sleep, I leave the computer feeling like the five year old who just received a cookie: intense happiness while eating and intense yearning for just one more chocolate chip delight. Then I turn on the TV and receive a pie in the face as English blares from the speakers and another culture shock hits me. But through the second culture shock, I know that the feeble connection I have with my heritage is twisted a bit tighter, made just a tiny bit stronger.
And yes, that’s definitely worth waking up at 7:30 a.m. on Saturday, on a four-day weekend.