Chinese Cinderella (2 page)

To those who were neglected and unloved as children, I have a particular message. In spite of what your abusers would have had you believe, please be convinced that each of you has within you something precious and unique.
Chinese Cinderella
is dedicated to you with the fervent wish that you will persist in trying to do your best in the face of hopelessness; to have faith that in the end your spirit will prevail; to transcend your traumas and transform them into a source of courage, creativity and compassion.

Mother Teresa once said that ‘loneliness and the feeling of being unwanted are the greatest poverty’. To this I will add: ‘Please believe that one single positive dream is more important than a thousand negative realities.’

Adeline Yen Mah

Author’s Note

Chinese is a pictorial language. Every word is a different picture and has to be memorised separately. There is no alphabet and no connection between the written and spoken language. A person can learn to read and write Chinese without knowing how to speak one word.

Because each word is a pictograph, Chinese calligraphy evokes a greater emotional response than the same word lettered in alphabet. The art of calligraphy is highly revered in China. Poetry written in calligraphy by ancient masters is prized and passed on from generation to generation.

Through
Chinese Cinderella
, I hope to intrigue you not only with the plight of a little girl growing up in China, but also interest you with her history and culture.

Names

In Chinese families, a child is called by many names.

1. My father’s surname is Yen (
). My siblings and I inherited his surname of Yen (
). Chinese surnames come at the beginning of a person’s name.

2. At birth, a baby is given a name by his or her parents. My given name is Jun‐ling. Since my surname comes first, my Chinese name is Yen Jun‐ling (
).

3. At home, a child is called by a name dependent on the order of his or her birth. The oldest daughter is called Big Sister, the second daughter Second Sister and so on. There are separate Chinese words for ‘older sister’ (jie
) and ‘younger sister’ (mei
); ‘older brother’ (ge
) and ‘younger brother’ (di
). Since I was the fifth child in my family, my name at home was Fifth Younger Sister (Wu Mei
). However, my younger siblings called me Wu Jie (
), which means ‘Fifth Older Sister’.

4. When the older generation calls me Wu Mei (
) the word ‘mei’ takes on the meaning of ‘daughter’. Wu Mei (
) now means Fifth Daughter.

5. The same goes for the word ‘di’. Er Di (
) can mean Second Younger Brother or Second Son.