My Family

When my Mom and Dad emigrated in 1988 it was my aunt (my mom’s sister) and my aunt’s then fiancé that took care of me for the four months before my dad came to bring me to the U.S.. I was five and Aunt was only 24 or so. Undoubtedly, that is the reason for the close bond that exists between Aunt and I. People would say that I had my father’s eyes and my mom’s face, but I would profess to them, often to my parents’ annoyance, that I had Aunt’s everything.

Me , Aunt , and Uncle eating late night grub (bbq squid and crawfish) . An example of the closeness between Aunt and I: I get out of the Zhengzhou train station at 7:30 am to my Aunt and Uncle waiting for me in the parking lot. Uncle wants to treat me to a nice breakfast, but Aunt refuses and says, “Who do you think Panpan is? Some sort of celebrity? No, we’re going to eat what we normally would eat!” Twenty cent bowls of porridge and hard-boiled eggs it is! Damn it’s good to be with family.

As an 11, 13 and 15 year old, my summers would be spent entirely living with Aunt, Uncle-in-Law and cousin Mei Zijie (English name: Tom). When Tom was three he had to use the potty, and neither of his parents were home so I had to wipe his butt. Even today, with Tom at 15 years of age I still hold that over his head the way a parent would say, “Do you know how many of your diapers I had to change when you were a baby!”

On my Dad’s side I have two sets of families in Henan. Qian Wang, my 21 yr old cousin just finished her 3rd year of college. She gave herself the English name “Angel”. I guess it could have been worse. It could have been “Candy”. My other cousin, Di Wang, recently finished his junior year of high school. He plays basketball religiously, and recently dyed his hair brownish. During dinner yesterday we were chiding him over the girly stickers he had on his mp3 player. Finally it came out that he has a girlfriend. I tell ya…Chinese kids these days.

Dad's side. Angel front and center.
All of my cousins address me as, ge (guh) or “older brother” while I address them by their names. Growing up an only child, this is one of the idiosyncrasies of Chinese culture that I love the most.