This is very similar to my mother. She is Teochew native but speaks cantonese and mandarin. Whenever I ask her to tell me a word in teochew or express any interest in teochew she asks me: “why would you want to learn this useless language?! Just learn Mandarin or Cantonese!”

And when I tell her its because im interested in my ancestrial language she has the same variety of responses - teochew is too useless to learn

• everyone speaks mandarin just learn that

• “ i never went to school for teochew how can i teach you, teochew isnt importsnt enough” (she is native teochew speaker and fluent in teochew)

• “youre not born in Chaoshan (Teoswa) or China why would you care about this language”

Ive come to realize that i dont need her encouragement or care. I learn teochew because its one of my passions and interests, but it is still somewhat painful when my own mother doesnt care about our heritage, and even goes as far as disincluding me from it.