My dad will be 84 next week. Here is his story.
Dad was born in 1930 and grew up amidst the political turmoil of China prior to the communist revolution. My Grandpa, a county governor, was assassinated for political reasons when dad was only 13. My grandma sent dad away to a boarding school, where he became a good catholic and befriended a catholic missionary. This friendship proved to be pivotal in dad’s life, for in 1948 as the communists were about to take power, the missionary hastily made arrangements to help my dad flee China. Dad had to act immediately with no time to think it over or say goodbyes, so he wrote grandma a letter telling her what he was doing. Dad would never see his mother again.
Dad struggled mightily here in America. The missionary had made arrangements for Dad to attend Catholic University, but as a History major he was failing his classes because he could not understand the English language well enough, so he changed his major to physics, eventually earning his masters and a PhD. His first Christmas here he had no money and no place to go when school recessed for the holidays, so a kind hearted custodian left the door unlocked to the dorm so dad could sneak back in to have a place to sleep over the break. He spent that break cold (they shut the heat off during break), alone, and starving, hiding in the closed dorms.
The Catholic church offered him only a partial scholarship, so dad still had to come up with money for part of the tuition, room and board. He spent several summers working the fields of some catholic farms as a farm hand. He sold shoes. He sold encyclopedias door to door. He worked as a waiter. With no one to turn to for help, Dad did anything he had to do to survive. When he ate his meals at the house he was boarding at, dad always made sure he ate at the same time as the women boarders, just so he could eat their leftovers. To escape the sweltering heat and humidity of the DC summers, dad would buy a ticket to the early matinee at the movie theater and sleep all day in the air conditioned theater, leaving at sunset to then study through the night.
Dad was a survivor, and he fought and clawed his way out of his difficult situation to provide my family with a decent middle class American life. I am always appreciative of how blessed I am and I have never forgotten all that my dad went through to give me the life that I have, so I have made sure to seize and make the most of the opportunities I have been given here in the U.S.
If dad never made it out of China he would probably not have survived under the communist regime. As the eldest son of a prominent politician, dad would have been a marked man. If he did survive, our family would have been oppressed and not afforded the opportunities to educate or better ourselves. My cousins in China today? Two of them are doing ok- a nurse and a government worker. The rest? Tobacco farm laborers and truck drivers.
The successful life that I have I owe to God, and I owe to my dad. Dad struggled so that I would have a chance to live the American dream, and I have never forgotten it.
Dad was born in 1930 and grew up amidst the political turmoil of China prior to the communist revolution. My Grandpa, a county governor, was assassinated for political reasons when dad was only 13. My grandma sent dad away to a boarding school, where he became a good catholic and befriended a catholic missionary. This friendship proved to be pivotal in dad’s life, for in 1948 as the communists were about to take power, the missionary hastily made arrangements to help my dad flee China. Dad had to act immediately with no time to think it over or say goodbyes, so he wrote grandma a letter telling her what he was doing. Dad would never see his mother again.
Dad struggled mightily here in America. The missionary had made arrangements for Dad to attend Catholic University, but as a History major he was failing his classes because he could not understand the English language well enough, so he changed his major to physics, eventually earning his masters and a PhD. His first Christmas here he had no money and no place to go when school recessed for the holidays, so a kind hearted custodian left the door unlocked to the dorm so dad could sneak back in to have a place to sleep over the break. He spent that break cold (they shut the heat off during break), alone, and starving, hiding in the closed dorms.
The Catholic church offered him only a partial scholarship, so dad still had to come up with money for part of the tuition, room and board. He spent several summers working the fields of some catholic farms as a farm hand. He sold shoes. He sold encyclopedias door to door. He worked as a waiter. With no one to turn to for help, Dad did anything he had to do to survive. When he ate his meals at the house he was boarding at, dad always made sure he ate at the same time as the women boarders, just so he could eat their leftovers. To escape the sweltering heat and humidity of the DC summers, dad would buy a ticket to the early matinee at the movie theater and sleep all day in the air conditioned theater, leaving at sunset to then study through the night.
Dad was a survivor, and he fought and clawed his way out of his difficult situation to provide my family with a decent middle class American life. I am always appreciative of how blessed I am and I have never forgotten all that my dad went through to give me the life that I have, so I have made sure to seize and make the most of the opportunities I have been given here in the U.S.
If dad never made it out of China he would probably not have survived under the communist regime. As the eldest son of a prominent politician, dad would have been a marked man. If he did survive, our family would have been oppressed and not afforded the opportunities to educate or better ourselves. My cousins in China today? Two of them are doing ok- a nurse and a government worker. The rest? Tobacco farm laborers and truck drivers.
The successful life that I have I owe to God, and I owe to my dad. Dad struggled so that I would have a chance to live the American dream, and I have never forgotten it.
