[lit-ideas] Re: Growing Old the Hard Way: China, Russia, India

  • From: Omar Kusturica <omarkusto@xxxxxxxxx>
  • To: lit-ideas@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
  • Date: Tue, 18 Apr 2006 23:38:00 -0700 (PDT)


--- Andy Amago <aamago@xxxxxxxxxxxxx> wrote:

> I wonder how much of family taking care of the
> elderly is mythology.  I saw Tokyo Story on
> Saturday, 1953 movie, Japanese.  It was one of those
> nothing happens movies but it was quite the study in
> Japanese family life.  I was surprised.  In 1953,
> and I suspect it's worse now, there was a big
> disconnect between generations and not much bonding
> within families.  The parents in the movie lived
> long distances away from their grown children, and
> did not know their grandchildren.  The parents go to
> visit their grown children, and they are treated
> politely, lots of bowing, but clearly they are a
> burden.  The grandfather had been a heavy drinker
> when his children were growing up, regularly coming
> home drunk, so he was disconnected from them.  There
> was no family to take care of this older Japanese
> couple.  Generally there was an isolation in the
> movie among and between family members.  And this is
> from the country that does ancestor worship. 
> Ancestors are easy to worship; real peopl
>  e are hard to deal with.  I suspect China is not
> much different, lots of myth, but the reality is
> quite different (maybe Omar can tell us what happens
> to the elderly there).  

*Most Chinese couples in their 20s to 40s maintain
close relationships with the parents, and often live
with them. This is not so much about ancestor worship
but there are good practical reasons for it. As most
younger women nowadays work, the parents are extremely
useful at taking care of the kids, helping with
keeping the house etc. They will usually have some
savings on the side, too. And, of course, many young
couples cannot afford to buy their own apartments. The
things may be different with middle-class couples in
big cities that make enough money to buy their own
apartments, to send the kids to good kindergartens, to
hire house help etc. There will probably be more
disconnect as the personal incomes rise, for now the
traditional bonds are still very strong.

O.K.

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