When I think family dynamics and dramas, I always end up going back to Reply 1988! I'll never forget that scene where they were all in that tiny room watching TV and Jungbong wins the lottery. Just thinking about it gets me a little misty.

Families come in all different shapes and forms! Can't wait to read everyone's thoughts and stories this month ♡

I have many stories I could tell, but since it's not my personal stories, I don't think it's right for me to turn it into an essay (even if those are not really a secret in the family). So, I think I'll sit this one out, and just wait patiently for tons of unexpected stories from other beanies. *preparing popcorn and tissues in advance*

Dear Beanies, hold my tea....

*rolls up sleeves, readying to type up entire blurb about my family roots & history because ALL of it is drama*

Haha I joke-- but I am a mix of many cultures despite my family being mostly all just Chinese :)

I, myself, am a CBC-- a Canadian-born Chinese.

My mom was born and raised in Ho Chi Minh city of Vietnam and lived in the Saigon area--my maternal grandma and aunt (my mom's sister) are a mean cook when it comes to Vietnamese cuisine... SO GOOD OMG-- but her ancestral roots come from somewhere in the Guangdong Province of China (which doesn't help narrow it down, because the area is quite vast lol) and I say "somewhere" because I remember her telling me specifically where before but I have since forgot it lol All of my mom's siblings have gone off to marry someone of pure Vietnamese race, so all of my cousins on my mom's side are half Chinese/half Vietnamese.
On my dad's side, he himself and all of his siblings were born and raised in Hong Kong but his side of the family are all pure Shanghainese.
All of my dad's siblings have gone off to marry someone of pure Chinese race from Hong Kong which actually can mean a lot of things because Hong Kong is a place made up of Han Chinese which is the bigger umbrella that comprises of people who are Taishanese, Teochew, Hakka, and Cantonese.

So I am quite a few things, but at the same time, I am still just one thing, and that is Chinese :)

Oh. My. God. This theme sounds awesome!

Makjang stories take 2 incoming, assa~ 😎

Ohhh the stories i can tell yay!

Excited to read all of the entries! Who knows, maybe a kdrama writer will browse through the entries and ask the author if their story could be used in his/her writing?

I don't have a drama-like story. I pretty much live a mundane life irl. But my parents did have a drama of their own at some point. I don't know much about the details of their story, but from what they had told me - my Japanese grandmother was against her daughter's relationship with a Canadian-Mexican. Against all odds, she eloped with him to Canada and got married. They had me a year after marriage. 10 years later, they filed for divorce and decided they were better off remain friends for the rest of their lives. It's not the typical HEA, but this is one of those times real life's HEA is far off different from romance drama's HEA. Real life has a story after HEA; it never ends.

My relationship with them is great and I like seeing them talk like good old friends with no animosity between them whenever my Dad comes to town and visits me, so I don't consider my family as dysfunctional at all. 🙂

My mom and grandmother reconciled. My grandmother sounds like one of those makjang mothers from the drama. I still, to this day, am terrified of her; good thing she doesn't speak English. 🙃 But surprisingly, she never blamed my mom at all for her decisions to elope and marry even when she was completely against their relationship.

Most of my family's stories are lost, so I have little to contribute this month.

As we discovered from #makjangmondays, Beanies have some amazing stories lurking behind their avatars. It's possibly what even inspired this month's theme.
I look forward to some hard core makjang cray cray dropping this month. Should be a lot of fun.

Ohh wow! I might compile my #makjangmondays posts for this month's theme! It might be a hilarious read. :P

This is quite a personal theme but I look forward to reading.

By the way, I've only watched a handful of family dramas: OJAKGYO BROTHERS, HOUSE OF BLUEBIRD, and FATHER IS STRANGE. These dramas showed at least one dysfunctional family, with people who make frustrating decisions (such is life, but some drama characters suffered needlessly and were unbelievably stupid).

Fortunately these dramas also showed a few relatively ordinary families, which gives me hope that not all family dramas all makjang fests. So, if you know any good family dramas please let me know!

Yay! Thanks for taking up my suggestion @stroopwafel. I was reading one of the posts on "Hey, That's me" theme (specifically on dysfunctional families) when I remembered a family drama that's worthy of being a TV drama, but it didn't really fit the theme of the month and I wished for such a theme

Now I have to go and write the darn thing!!!!

In the last two months my family has become a makjang daily with all kinds of twists, shockers, and tears. But as these aren't my stories to tell publicly, I'll stick the historical makjang family tales, and maybe get around to writing about murderers and treasonous spies.

Oof i've had a few super dramatic family stuff happen...no birth secrets but more telenovela/soap opera than kdrama LOL but as others have said these are not my stories to tell and my life is fortunately not that dramatic...I think I would've preferred if we could write on family drama in kdramas we've connected with...for example the way a mother/daughter relationship is depicted in a drama or the sweet father/daughter relationships some dramas depict etc

All my family's drama like moments come under the weekend family drama & makjang category, & I'm not brave enough to share them with the world. I'll look forward to seeing what beanies post!