Confused Couple Wins Clash Over Baffling ‘Banner’

Linda and Chi-hwa Hong felt as though they had been plunged into “The Case of the Mysterious Banner.”

Warning notices arrived in the mail at their condominium. There were accusations and fines.

After months of confusion, they finally found the solution to the mystery of why they were being fined: strips of red paper called chuen lien pasted around the door of a condominium unit they manage.

What the Hongs, who moved from Taiwan to Alhambra five years ago, considered chuen lien, or Chinese good luck paper, the condominium board considered “a banner,” strictly prohibited by the complex’s bylaws.

On Wednesday, after months of controversy and the assessment of more than $200 in fines, the matter was settled when the board agreed to revoke the fines and drop the issue.

But the case highlights communication clashes and cultural misunderstandings that often confront immigrants and their neighbors in the San Gabriel Valley.

The Hongs, who help manage a friend’s condo unit in a building at 1012 S. Marengo Ave., first were drawn into the controversy in January, 1989, when they received a notice from the building’s property management company, warning, “Remove Banner from Building.”

The couple, who still are trying to master the English language, said they were puzzled by the notice, accompanied by a demand that they pay a $25 fine.

Linda Hong, recalling something she had learned in English class, set out in search of a flag-type display. She found none. Then she speculated that one of the tenants, an 80-year-old Chinese man, may have hung a shirt on the balcony to dry, a common practice in Taiwan where few homes have clothes dryers. The Hongs warned the tenants not to leave anything out on the balcony, and they paid the fines.

Those tenants moved out in August, 1989. In September, while the unit was still vacant, the Hongs received another violation notice. Perplexed, Linda Hong checked the word “banner” in an English-Chinese dictionary and asked her white colleagues what it meant. They told her it is like a flag, she said.

“We looked everywhere,” Linda Hong said. “I even went up on the roof.”

But the Hongs said they found only chuen lien, which Chinese families traditionally hang on door frames at Chinese New Year. A chuen lien typically features auspicious wishes such as “God bless this family,” and “May peace be with you.”

Some Chinese families leave them up for an entire year for fear that removing them would bring bad luck. The Hongs said the six-inch wide chuen lien strips seemed a natural part of the door frame.

“I would never have thought it was the chuen lien, “ Linda Hong said.

Finally, after realizing that the red paper strips were indeed the source of the complaint, the Hongs removed them. By then, however, they were locked in controversy with the condominium board and had retained a lawyer to help them fight the fines.

The heart of their argument was that the warning about the “banner” was too vague. The building management company disagreed.

“It was adequately described to them what the problem was,” said Crawford Moller, an owner of Moller Properties Inc., which manages the complex for the homeowners’ group. But he acknowledged that staff members who spoke to the Hongs may not have had first-hand knowledge of what the offending “banner” was.

Four members of the seven-member condo board were present Wednesday, including two of Chinese descent. The vote was 3-0, with board member Tony Provenzano abstaining.

“It was a poor use of words,” Provenzano said. But he said the Hongs should have come to the board for help sooner. “We revoked the fines because they are here, and we can see they actually did not understand.”

“We had different concepts of what a banner was,” added Bette Herron, another board member. “That’s part of the root of the problem.”

The Hongs’ attempts to iron out the problem before Wednesday had been hampered by additional language difficulties.

“Sometimes we want to say something, but sometimes our English is limited,” Linda Hong said. “We use English words, but it may be not the real meaning. When you’re nervous, you can’t express your thoughts thoroughly.”

She said she was satisfied with the board’s decision.

“This is America,” she said. “You have to follow their rules.”

But she added: “We really didn’t know what they were talking about.”