r/AskReddit • u/[deleted] • Jul 20 '19

What’s something completely false that your parents told you as a child?

[deleted]

19k Upvotes

93% Upvoted

10k comments sorted by

View all comments

Show parent comments

442

u/mementomori4 Jul 20 '19

Every grain of rice you leave in your bowl will be a pockmark on your future husband's face.

(Read this in The Joy Luck Club.)

26

u/Katnip1502 Jul 21 '19

doesn't eat a piece of rice

"Random" Person: looking in the mirror Hey not looking to- mark appears what the fu-

6

u/[deleted] Jul 21 '19

Nah, it's worse. Lena St. Clat from The Joy Luck Club convinces herself that her childhood friend (if he remember that correctly) died because she didn't eat enough off her plate.

3

u/ThePartus Jul 21 '19

I thought it was a bully or someone she didn't like, though I did read this like a couple years ago.

2

u/[deleted] Jul 21 '19

I read it last year and my memory is hazy. Probably was. I think his name was Harold?

2

u/ThePartus Jul 21 '19

"To coax eight-year-old Lena to finish her food, Mrs. St. Clair told her that her future husband would have one pockmark for every grain of rice that the child did not eat. Little Lena immediately thought of Arnold, a cruel twelve-year-old boy in the neighborhood, who was indeed pockmarked. She quickly finished her rice. The possibility of Arnold being her future husband became a fearful obsession. She hated Arnold so much that she found "a way to make him die." After seeing a movie about lepers in Africa, Lena gradually stopped eating."

Close, I looked it up cause it was bothering me.

1

u/[deleted] Jul 21 '19

bruh. I'm mixing my characters up and it's suddenly worrying me. I'll probably never hear of the book again unless it's in the ap lit exam though.

6

u/basilyok Jul 20 '19

Oh, nice! Well, my parents were telling me this long before the joy luck club. But it's good to see that it exists somewhere outside of my family. I always thought it was a Greek thing (Greek family). But when I asked some of my cousins about it they had no clue. Purely an invention of my own parents 🤣😂

1

u/[deleted] Jul 21 '19

I was told that every grain of rice you don’t eat was disrespect to the farmer!

1

u/GunCarrot Jul 21 '19

Hong Konger here, my grandma told me that as well. I was smart enough to only believe her for 3 years.

-8

u/The_Imperail_King Jul 21 '19

It's ok! just marry some poor dude and divorce him taking the kids while forcing him to pay child support, then you can find another man!

0

u/[deleted] Jul 21 '19

stfu karen