Ryan Lin - China - 1950's

My grandmother’s name is Liu Xiang (刘香). She was born in 1954. In her family, she had two sisters including herself and two brothers. Her biological mother was very poor and couldn’t afford to raise her. So instead her parent’s friends took her in. She was treated and raised better than what her biological mother could. She treated them with great respect in return. However, she did not forget about who gave birth to her. Back in China, she used to visit her biological mother often, also providing financial support. As for school, it was fine for her, though she doesn’t really like it. She had at most a middle school to early high school education back then, because traditionally more resources were focused on educating males than females. Her first job was similar to being a bookkeeper. There were times where she had to go out to the rural areas and convince people to do things they didn't want to do. She had a hard time resting because at times she sees people during the night. It was at her work where she met my grandfather. Just like most people living in China at the time, the communist influence caused many issues for her. Her foster father died during this time period. This is probably due to him having decent wealth. It is likely that he opposed communism because then everyone would get the same income regardless of job. This meant that a CEO of a company would earn the same amount as a farmer which wouldn’t feel fair due to the difference in the difficulty obtaining the jobs. However, speaking out against the communist group which was a major group in China or opposing it would be very risky.