I'll never forget May 3, 1990, the dat Tien-Tien came into our lives. Ahong, the wife of my youngestbrother Aling gave birth after a very difficult labour of five hours. We already had a name for the
baby before she was born. She would be called Tien-Tien which meant 'sweetness'.
As we waited at the hospital, our joy quickly turned to grief when the attending physician
announced that he could detect no signs of life in Tien-Tien. There was no breathing, no heartbeat,
so he finally declared the baby dead.
Aling decide to lay the body next to the Taizi River. To outsiders, this might be strange: to us, a
Chinese family with almost no money or resources, the prospect of encouraging the baby's spirit slip
away to a better world in a beau
ful setting made a great deal of sense. We planned to return later
to bury Tien-Tien's remains and pay honour to her.
Aling wrapped his child in a red fl oral quilt and set off for the river. He gently laid his baby in a patch
of grass along the bank of the river.
A week later, while I was walking home from work, I overheard several women talking about one of
her friends. They said their friend heard a baby crying and the sound came from a patch of grass
along the river bank. They further explained that the baby had been placed in a local orphanage.
Something inside me said it must have been Tien-Tien. Without waiting any longer, I ran to the
orphanage. In the room I saw Tien-Tien in a crib covered in dirt but very much alive.
What is the best title for the text?