A Short History of my Dad


My father tells everyone he was born in Beijing, moved to Taiwan when he was 8, and then came over the US at the age of 33 to study at the University of Iowa. He was the first of the family (on both sides) to come to the U.S.

In actuality, my dad was born in Xiamen, a coastal city near Taiwan, where my grandfather was stationed as a customs clerk working for the Kuomingtang (run by Chiang Kai Shek). After my dad was a year old, the family got transferred to Beijing, and that's where my dad lived until he was about 8. That's why he tells people he was born in Beijing. Since most people have heard of it, and that's where he spent his formative years.

The family left Beijing after it was apparent the Kuomingtang was being run out of the city by the Communists, and they fled southward back to the home town of Fuzhou, where they stayed temporarily before moving to Taiwan, when it was obvious the Communists were going to take over China. So my dad got to spend some time in the family home in Fuzhou as a child.

It was this family home that we visited while we were in China this past November. My dad and mom were brought to the family home by my cousin Chiu Ping (my 2nd uncle's son). Only part of the house is still standing today. The front part of the home which sat on the edge of a river was torn down. My dad remembers the river as being quit large and quite rapid, but when we were there the river was quit small and still. In the area where the front of the home used to stand, an apartment building has been built.

To get to the remaining part of the home, you need to enter a side alley and walk to the back of the apartment building. When my mom and dad were there, they they took some video footage of the area (now on the DVD I created). While they were doing this, an elderly lady stepped out of the building and asked what they were doing. My cousin replied that his great-grandfather used to own the building, and the old woman spoke my great grandfather's name in Chinese. My dad, upon hearing the name said, "that's my grandfather." She let my parents and my cousin see the inside of her home, and my father took some video of the interior as it stands today as well. She also mentioned that a woman (the name of which was my father's older sister) used to come around and collect rent, but she hadn't been around for a while. I'll explain that in a later entry to this web log.