Let me tell you a story of my mother-in-law. I know, there have been many stories about her in this blog but she just gives me so many things to write about. I do not know how she does it but somehow something happens nearly every day to write about and I believe she is far from being done with crazy.

This particular story happened last summer when we were in Xi’an. It was once again one of those days when we visited my wife’s grandmother. Not only is the grandmother living there but also her uncle with his wife and daughter. This little girl is about four to five years old and the younger cousin of my wife. Basically every time we visit MIL has something to complain about such as granny is playing too much Mahjong, granny is not drinking enough water, granny is spoiling the little girl too much, and granny is not doing enough for the little girl. In case it’s not granny’s fault it is either MIL’s brother, or my wife or father-in-law who has done something wrong.

 

Where did I stop? Oh, everyone is doing something wrong. Alright, so we visited last summer once again. We were playing with my wife’s little cousin and MIL noticed the clothes of the poor little girl. She took a closer look at the girl, turned her about and then said to her brother “What are these for ugly clothes, how can you make her wear something like this?”

 

As you can see MIL is very delicate when forming accusation and taking always the highest care not to make anybody feel bad. Naturally all people were looking at the little girl and her clothes, then at uncle who looked confused and then at MIL who was still poking the girl and observing the clothes. What came then would be pretty weird for other people but is just another usual day for MIL.The uncle just looked at his older sister, smiled and replied “But older sister, you bought these clothes and gave them to her last time you visited”…

Of course MIL just tried to deny it as she never ever does anything wrong and has much better taste than this but father-in-laws comment about his wife makes more and more sense “She has water in the head” 脑子进水了 or “She has fishes in the head” 脑子养鱼了.FIL is indeed a very wise man.

 

This brings me to MIL and how stubborn she is. However she must have gotten her stubbornness and weirdness from somewhere and  granny comes into the play here. Grandmother is also really weird and stubborn, sure no competition for MIL but still playing in a high weirdness league. For example one of the main discussions they have when visiting granny is that she should not cut the little girls hairs anymore. For unknown reasons she always cuts the hairs of the girl very short and very unprofessional. The result is that the girl always has some really crazy hairstyle when we visit. Everyone is telling grandma to stop doing it, she then agrees but as soon as the girl’s parents are out at work she goes back to practice her hairdressing techniques on her. Thankfully the little girl doesn’t seem to mind it yet but I have the feeling that the combined influence of weird and stubborn grandma and MIL visiting will create yet another crazy family member I can write about in a few years.