Jin Yu's Saturday

Every Saturday morning, Jin Yu takes her GongFu class at Chinatown. She practices Hong Quan, a traditional Chinese Gongfu, her mother learns to play Chinese drum. After the class, Jin Yu has lunch with Zhaogu, her younger sister, her mother and her father in her favorite Chinese restaurant.

His father , Jeff Gammage, often wears a T shirt with English and Chinese words: Jin Yu Loves Baba.

Jeff is a reporter at the Inquirer. He adopted Jin Yu and Zhaogu from China. He then decided to embed Chinese culture into his daughters’ life.

I was shocked by the fact that so many Americans adopt Chinese girls, including Meg Ryan. According to Xinhua News Agency, There have been about 40,000 Chinese children adopted by Americans by 2006.

The other thing shocked me is that many American families try hard to teach their children Chinese culture, which is very different from the things in China. In China if a family adopts a child, they may try their best to cover the adoption truth, especially to the child himself. Some families even move to a new city.

Why? I guess to Chinese it is a stigma both to these families that can not have their own children and to children abandoned by their original families.

Jeff told me it was the same thing in American two decades ago, but now things changed.

I guess one of the main reasons is that they cannot cover the different colors and faces since they adopt Chinese children. So, let’s be proud of them!