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By ROSEANNE KUE

Grandma always said, "Eating more hot pepper will help you swim better," but I don't know why that was so important because we never went swimming. To this day, I think I'm a better swimmer just because I eat so much hot pepper.

In her homeland, salt and meat were rare; they often ate sticky rice with pepper, the only flavor that grew besides the opium. "Opium," she said, "was like death: It was always plentiful."

I've seen my aunt do it the old way, poking a toothpick into the pepper sauce, then rubbing it onto her nipple. Her son drinks from it, not knowing the difference. He loves it and so does she.

The newer generations shy away from it, having become accustomed to American foods and flavors, but there's magic in pepper that can bring me to tears.

More real than our music or our 30-year-old written language, great-grandma's pepper has kept her alive for 107 years. She's coming to visit in July.

Roseanne Kue graduated with a B.M. in voice last May.