Small Wonders- Me and Dad (with his girlfriend)

I started a new photo project, tentatively called Small Wonders. It's actually not so new, it's something I've been working on in different forms. The inspiration is my Dad, who I only got to see about once a year growing up. When he died a couple of years ago, it was hard. But the experience wasn't so immediate even though I was there the day he passed away and participated in the two week-long funeral rites. For some time afterwards, I would forget and think that I could still call him. I often still speak about him in the present tense. I have dreams with him in them. Not being with him throughout the whole of his sickness removed the tangibility of it. I have decided to post a picture a day from the project as I sort through it, with tentative titles, just to get it going. Some of the photos are old, and some are new. Here's one from our trip to Hualien.


Me and Dad (with his girlfriend) Rona Chang

Hakka heritage

In the travel section of the NYTimes, I found this article on The Earthen Homes of Yongding County, in Fujian, China. I had seen a miniature version of this type of structure at "Windows on the World" in Taiwan. The Hakkas (I am ethnically Hakka on my father's side) have built these interesting earthen structures and they are now being considered for UNESCO heritage site designation.

On another Hakka note, I was sorting through a box of my dad's stuff last night and found our family genealogy handbook. I brought it to my mom, who helped me sort out how I should decipher the charts. Hakkas tend to favour male decendents and no where is it more obvious than in the family charts where only male decendents are listed. For example, our family tree shows my grandfather and my grandmother's name, below them, only their four sons names are listed, none of my five aunts are included. On the page where my family is listed, my father does not have any children listed under him (I have one other sibling, a sister) and my uncles who have sons have their names listed, but not their daughters. My mom commented that this was a heavy bias, maybe I should consider getting rid of the book!

(Photo by Barbara Koh from the NYTimes.)