As part of my information gathering for the book, I’ve been digging into material about the history of Guangzhou, my hometown. I’m learning a lot about the city that I called home for the first 10 years of my life. One cool tidbit I came across is the picture below of children of the Chen clan standing by the entrance to their ancestral hall. The photo was taken circa 1909. Last year, 100 years later, I visited the Chen family ancestral hall, now a tourist attraction. It’s just kind of amazing to look at the people of the family who once owned this history-rich place and to stand on the same grounds on which they roamed so long ago. Looking at that old photo, one can’t help but wonder about things like, “What were their names? What happened to them? Where are their descendants today?” In a way, I feel like the book I’m working on is an effort to preserve the answers for people who might one day look at our family photos 100 years from now and ask some of those same questions.
Children of the Chen clan, circa 1909.
Courtney and I standing on the same grounds as those Chen descendants in 2009.
Note: This entry is cross-posted at http://thezhus.tumblr.com, the blog focusing on my book-writing effort.