Retiredbum's Notes:

I don't know if the joke quoted below is a deadpan one, but it's really a pathetic one to me.   Parents, especially the parents under the protection of social network in modern age,  most likely don't expect to live off their children when they are old.  They had better see children succeeded in every walk of life and make them feel proud of.  But the filial duties that children have done or the success they have achieved won't make their parents really feel contented if there are no true reverence to their parents in the interactions involved.  In this "joke" The gifts the parents are expecting to receive from their kids should never be luxurious ones which are affordable to the successful kids; instead, they are expecting any kind of gifts as a token that could represent true respects to them. 

That is why  the Chinese character "孝" can not be accurately translated into "filial duty" in English.  That has been also why the "Ethic code of 孝" places the reverence to parents as the ultimate goal for children to pursue because the parents' love is the only unrequited love in the world:  it requires no return, it will never be tinted with jealousy to children's success.  What God will ask His believers to give Him in return?  Nothing but reverence.  So treat your parents like a god. 

QTE: 

 A real tit-for-tat...

 A couple was celebrating 50 years   together. Their three kids, all very   successful, agreed to a Sunday
   dinner in their honor.
 
"Happy Anniversary Mom and Dad," gushed
 son number one , now renowned Orthopedist, "Sorry I'm running late. I
 had an emergency at the hospital with a patient, you know how it is,
 and I didn't have time to get you a gift."
 
   "Not to worry son," said the father. "The
 important thing is that we're all together today."
 Son number two, a Trial Lawyer, arrived
> and announced, "You and Mom look great, Dad. I just flew in from Los
 Angeles between depositions and didn't have time to shop for you."
 "It's nothing son just forget it," said
 the father. "We're glad you were able to come."
 Just then the daughter, a Wall Streeter,
 arrived. "Hello and Happy Anniversary! I'm sorry, but my boss is
 sending me out of town and I was really busy packing so I didn't have
 time to get you anything."
 
The father not a word but just kept cool.
 
After they had finished dessert, the
 father said, "There's something your mother and I have wanted to tell
you for a long time. You see, we were very poor. Despite this, we were
 able to send each of you to college. Throughout the years your mother
 and I knew that we loved each other very much, but we just never found
 the time to get married."
   The three children gasped and all said,
 
"You mean we're bastards?"
 
"Yep," said the father.
 
"And cheap ones, too."  UNQTE