This is a picture of my maternal grandparents. My brother got my grandpa's long nose and bushy eyebrows. My grandpa doesn't look like your typical Chinese. My dad thinks he has some Arab blood in his ancestry.
Fujian (Fukien) Province was a trading center for ancient China. Long before Britain, Holland, and Portugal brought opium and sailed away with tea and silk, Fujian was a port city trading with Arabs and Persians during the Tang (618 – 907 CE) and Southern Song (1127 – 1279 CE) dynasties. These early travelers brought Islam to China and their mosques are still found in Fujian.
My dad also thinks that it's possible that was adopted as it was common for newly married couples to adopt a son before they have one of their own to ensure that they would have at least one heir. (My dad said that his parents also adopted a son after they got married but gave the child back after they had my uncle.) My parents say my grandpa does not look like any of his siblings. Most of his siblings have a resemblance to their father (my great-grandfather) and my grandpa often said that his own mother didn't love him. He often said that his grandma was the only one that loved him.
In this picture, he is wearing a western style peacoat. My mom said that my grandpa was very fashionable and he always like to dress nicely. He had initial success in his business, winning a major government contract that made him a lot of money. He would frequent nightclubs with his business associates and he was popular with the women.
My mom said this was when she was around 11 or 12 years old. My grandpa would take them to the Sheraton Manila Bay and they would order room service. This was a happy memory from her childhood.
During his success, he was accused by the Magsaysay administration of being a Communist collaborator and that was when he started going to Dagupan Chinese Baptist Church which was started by American missionaries. His thinking was that by affiliating with the Americans, he would not be seen as an ally of communist China. That seemed to work and the accusations against him were dropped. Then he stopped going to church.
After a while, his business failed, and he lost a lot of money. During this time, he drank heavily and fought with my grandma a lot. This was when my mom started getting sick with a nervous breakdown, always constantly washing her hands, and fearing that if she didn't wash her hands, my grandpa would die.
This was when my grandpa went back to church. And how would later testify that God wouldn't let him go. He caused his businesses to fail so that he could find God again. Later God healed my mom from this condition.
Comments
Post a Comment