Hot Cross Chinese Buns

By Jody Worsham, Jan. 2011

All rights reserved for more buns 30 minutes later

My nine-year-old has been taking violin lessons since August. I am a piano girl so this has been a whole new experience for me. I never knew there was so much to playing the "fiddle". Evidently there is much strengthening and conditioning of muscles before you ever get to the "fiddling".

We have been conditioning arms and fingers now for four months so you can imagine the excitement when she played her first song today, "Hot Cross Buns". In fact she was so excited, she played it again… and again, … and again. This was the first song I ever played on the piano so I was quite familiar with the tune. I now understand why my mother chose the day I learned that song to beat the rugs, wash the windows, and rearrange all the pots and pans in the bottom of the old metal cook stove as I practiced again…and again…and again.

Her violin teacher must have had great success teaching her other students that same song today because after the fourth run through, she asked her to stop. "Here's a flyer about the 2011 International Young Artists String Competition being held here on Saturday" said her violin teacher. I gulped. Now I'm very competitive and I push my children to achieve beyond their means and I am very proud of their achievements. Don't get me wrong, I thought "Hot Cross Buns" sounded good but good enough for international competition? Then the nine-year-old said "I don't think I'm ready!"

"No, no, no I just thought you might want to go and listen," she replied as both the nine-year-old and I exhaled. "Oh, I knew that," I lied. I took the flyer and noted the names. It was indeed an international competition. Competing in violin and cello were Tsai, Chen, Wu, Kapoor, Nakashima, Francisco, and Xiaoxiao. I don't know how these people found their way to our little spot in the piney woods. I don't even think you could find it on a GPS, Tom Tom, or On Star but here they were.

Unless I change my child's name to Ching Chang Kim Su, I don't think my blue eyed blond child stands a chance even if she played Hot Cross Buns with her toes.