Now, I've had the misfortune of going to a 100% Vietnamese community-run church for Holy week mass. First of all, let me just describe this place. It's located smack-dab between some residential areas and a plaza with some gas stations. Across the street is Manila and Carl's Jr. It's probably the worst or best place to put a church, depending on how you look at it. Turns out this place was formerly a flower shop, and was probably not meant to accommodate half of San Jose's Vietnamese Catholic population.
But you know how we viets are...we tried to anyway.
So Easter Eve rolls around, and that's when they all start to fuss about their salvation. My family and I knew that the church was going to be full of people. But we were optimistic. We planned to come early so that we would have a better chance of finding some reasonable parking and seats. Mass started at 6:00, so we come at 5:30.
We ended up having to park in the Carl's Jr. parking lot because it turns out that the other 500 people attending decided to plan ahead too.
Finding seats was even worse. The pews in the church were all full up, so what they did was they got some folding chairs to put up, extending to the back exit of the church. And thanks to our fertile, breeding brothers and sisters, it was still not enough. But there was this group of elderly gentleman sitting in the back row who were part of the procession, and they offered to give us their seats when it was time for them to go. We thanked them sincerely and waited for the procession to start.
5 minutes later.
10 minutes later.
15 freaking minutes later, we still chillin.'
Then we hear the gong and these gentleman get up to join the priest outside of the church. We're about to sit down when this stampede of bodies in my peripheral come in and SA-WOOSH-- within seconds the entire back row was filled up.
My parents were the only ones who got seats in time. (In my defense, I had to worry about my sister, too >.>)
My sister and I go down the row only to find one lonely little chair in the corner. I tell my sister to take the seat, but after all that's happened the little girl still had the nerve to say "no."
But I had a plan. I knew where they kept the extra chairs for big events like these. Surreptitiously, I go around the back into the open shed where they kept a good hundred chairs, grabbed three, and snuck back around inside. As soon as I cross the threshold, I get bombarded by 6 or 7 mothers who clearly--pardon my french--needed to calm the fuck down. "Child, child, be a dear and show me where they keep the chairs. Are there enough for my family? *gestures to 3 kids and husband*" I point in the general direction only to find they were already busy trying to look for it.
Long story short, we endured mass, even when they turned off the lights for the first 15 minutes for the sake of show despite how terrifying it was to be in a dark building with 300 grubby bodies and candle flame (fire hazard?)
It wasn't all bad, though. As fussy as vietnamese families can get, I witnessed a lot of beautiful moments that people had. A mother kissing her baby, a husband embracing his wife...maybe this is what Easter's supposed to be about. Huh. Every year you learn something nice. Happy Easter, y'all!
(I'll be enjoying me some of this....)
