15.8% Angmoh - just spoke to my parents

Hi guys, further to receiving the result of my DNA test which revealed that I have 15.8% European blood, I have just spoken to my parents about it. My dad's reaction is flat denial. He said, "We're pure Chinese - the scientists at the lab must've made some kind of mistake, this is impossible." I told him that it was highly unlikely - a mistake would be like if they told me I was 95% African or 80% European. He was aghast at the thought that he could have any European blood at all! And I'm like come on, 15.8% is a small percentage, it's not that much. So I asked him to tell me more about his ancestors and I made some notes as he told me about what he knew about his ancestors.

What does it mean to be mixed? 

He told me that my great grandfather was a Qing dynasty 官 (state official) in China and my great grandfather had two sons quite late in his life - one of whom (ie. my grandfather) moved to British-Malaya where he married my grandmother who was also Hakka. He didn't know anything beyond my great grandfather apart from some stories he heard about him in his childhood. "You see," he explained. "Your great grandfather, my grandfather, was in China whilst we grew up in Malaysia. We heard stories of course, but it was not like I ever met him. It's not like we could just get on a plane and go to China in those days, things were so different then. We're talking about the 1940s, 1950s..." He couldn't remember much about his mother's parents - but he said he knew they were Hakka but he couldn't remember if they were born in Malaya or China. She was betrothed to my grandfather from a very young age and didn't come from a rich family - so yeah, she did well in marrying a rich man.

Okay, so I got some information on my dad's side of the family but nothing to lead me any closer to my European roots - so I tried my mother. Her story is far more interesting. We started with my Hokkien maternal grandmother "Ah Jia" whom I knew well - Ah Jia was born in Singapore but her parents were born in China and had moved to Singapore before my grandmother was born. They were Hokkiens from near Amoy (Xiamen) and nope, absolutely no trace of anyone mixed or white. My mother was convinced, it  wasn't her mother - there was just no way anyone on her side of the family could be anything but Hokkien.

How much of your family history do you actually know?

I never got to know my maternal grandfather - my mother's father had passed away years before I was born. "What about your father then?" I asked my mother.

"No idea. He was adopted."

Woah. Please mum, tell me more. "He was... well, he was .... sold. Adopted is a nice word but back in those days, it wasn't uncommon to sell your children if you didn't have the means to care for them. This all happened back in China. He was sold as a baby to a richer family and they raised him - but from a young age, he was expected to work for them. He took their surname, learnt their language... He did all kinds of chores in their house and when they found themselves short on money when he was a teenager, they sold him off again."

"What?! Like a slave?" I asked. I was so shocked at the prospect of my grandfather having been sold as a slave! I remember hearing stories of his adoption in the past, but I didn't realize it wasn't adoption by our modern standards.

"No... well..." My mother struggled with her words. "Things were different then. If his biological parents hadn't sold him to that rich family, then he would've probably starved to death or had a very difficult life. He had no where to go, so if a rich family was willing to 'adopt' him - give him a roof over his head, feed him, clothe him in exchange for his labour as a child, then he was very lucky, you understand?"

My late Grandfather was "sold" as a labourer to a merchant in Singapore. 

She continued, "But things changed in that family and they found that they couldn't continue to 'keep' him as he got older. They just didn't have enough work for him to justify 'keeping' him, so he was sold again as a teenager. He was sold to a merchant looking to bring strong, young men to come to work in Singapore - he agreed to go to Singapore, it was not like he was sent there against his will. Anyway, that's how he ended up in Singapore. He worked very hard and repaid the debt for his passage to Singapore in a few years. That's when he met your grandmother and they married. You'd think that life got better for him, then the war (WW2) broke out and the Japanese invaded Singapore. I was a baby then, it was a long time ago. He became very sick during the war but never really recovered his health even after the war ended. That's when my older brother - your uncle - became the man of the family to take care of everyone in the family. Your uncle is a very great man."

I asked my mother, "Do you know where your father was from in China?"

Where is "Tua Bu Keh" in China??! Anyone?

My mother paused and thought long and hard. "I cannot remember if I am saying this correctly ... tua3 (big?) bu3 (???) keh4 (???). I am probably pronouncing it wrongly, I cannot remember. I don't even know where it is, sorry. I can't even remember if that was where his adopted family was or where he was from originally. My father didn't like talking about his earlier life, he had such a hard life - he had his share of bad luck and just when you think everything was okay and he had finally found happiness the Japanese had to invade Singapore."

I don't know if I can assume that just because my maternal grandfather's past is unknown, that I could just assume that the European blood came in via him - but it is a possibility that even my mother acknowledged, though she added, "I suppose your grandfather looked Chinese...? Chinese people come in all shapes and forms, some taller, some shorter, some darker, some fairer. I suppose, even if he had Angmoh blood, it couldn't have been too much? We never suspected otherwise. He was raised by a Chinese family, so he felt Chinese, acted like a Chinese man, spoke Chinese... but as for his ancestors, his bloodline - we don't know and I guess we may never ever know. I don't even know where to start to find out, who to ask - people didn't keep records meticulously in those days you know? It's not like all the details of his biological parents are in some file somewhere in an office in China - there were probably no records and maybe even my father didn't know who his biological parents were."

So! It could be from my mother's side after all via my grandfather, but all I can say at this stage is that even my parents can't be totally sure as they don't know much beyond what happened in South East Asia - they know precious little about their ancestors in China and given that all four of my grandparents have now passed away, it will be very hard for me to try to find out more. "I suppose that'll remain a mystery for our family," my mother said.