Chapter 375 - 195: Snowflake Chicken Porridge

Chapter 375: Chapter 195: Snowflake Chicken Porridge

"My father was from Hang City and came to Wuhan to run a silk business. After my mother was pulled ashore, her body, already weak, was soaked in the freezing river water. Fraught with fear, she fell gravely ill."

"My father saw she was too sick to even get out of bed and took meticulous care of her for over a month. Once she showed signs of improvement, he brought her back to Hang City. He hired renowned doctors to nurse her back to health, and it took more than a year before she finally recovered."

"My mother said that on several occasions, she thought she was going to die, but my father stubbornly pulled her back from the brink."

"My father spent all his business capital to save her and became known as a spendthrift. People made no shortage of cutting remarks, but he never argued back. He just said it was worth it."

"My mother knew he was the man for her, so they married. They did so without her parents’ blessing or a matchmaker’s word; they didn’t even hold a banquet."

"She made two sets of coarse cloth garments and bought a bolt of red silk. The two of them bowed to each other and were married in a simple earthen house in the countryside."

"My father’s family had fallen on hard times, so he joined others to work on ships sailing to Nanyang. Meanwhile, my mother was pregnant with my older sister, so she put aside her thoughts of returning to Sichuan."

"She said she sent several letters to her family in Rongcheng, but never received a reply, and so they lost contact. Her plan was to wait a few years for my sister to grow a little older before going home."

"My father earned some money in Nanyang. Hearing there were more opportunities to make money in the United States, he took my mother and my sister, who had just turned two, across the ocean to America."

"My mother said she never expected that move would last a lifetime, that she would never be able to go back."

"My father settled the family in New York. In a new and unfamiliar land, their silk business wasn’t exactly booming, but it was enough for them to live comfortably."

"A few more years passed, and I was born. The family business got busier and busier, so my mother stayed home to take care of the children. The thought of returning home was postponed again and again."

"Then, the war broke out."

"My mother read the newspaper every day, keeping a close watch on any news related to Sichuan."

"On August 20, 1939, I was six years old. It was my little sister’s third birthday. My mother had made her a cake, and the whole family was getting ready to celebrate. But then my mother saw the news in the paper about the August 19th Great Bombing of Jiazhou, which caused over five thousand casualties. She went to her room and cried for a long time. In the end, my father had to make dinner, and it was terrible."

"When I was in my teens, I remembered that day and specifically looked up the news from that date. That’s how I learned about the event. It left a deep impression on me and became a crucial piece of information in my search for my mother’s hometown."

"Later, my father and mother donated a lot of money to China. They sent back almost half of the factory’s annual profits. My mother also raised funds in our community, collecting a considerable sum. A portion of that money was used to buy medicine, which was then shipped back to China on merchant vessels."

"My mother said that once the war was over, she would definitely go home for a visit."

"But even after the war ended, she fell ill and was never able to return."

"She passed away from acute pneumonia at our home in New York in 1956. She was fifty-six. It all happened rather suddenly. I was away on business and only made it back to see her one last time. We didn’t even get to exchange more than a few words."

"I was heartbroken, but after her burial, I had to rush back to the factory to push the next project forward."

"It wasn’t until my father passed away from illness five years later that I had a sudden realization. Despite my booming business and my fluent, standard American English, I still felt like a rootless water plant."

"Over the next twenty-some years, I started trying to learn about China, studying the Chinese language and its characters. I found this jade pendant among my mother’s belongings, and the idea of finding my relatives popped into my head and refused to go away."

"With China’s reform and opening-up, I came into contact with some factories in the country and gradually established partnerships. Through the Zhejiang Business Association, I was able to find my father’s ancestral home and some of his relatives with relative ease."

"On this trip to China, I first went to Hang City to pay respects to my ancestors, and then I came to Sichuan. After many twists and turns, and with the tremendous help of Master Zhou and Master Xiao, I finally found my way to Linjiang."

"I’ve brought her jade pendant back to her hometown. In a way, she has come home, hasn’t she?"

"She has! Of course she has!" Kong Qingfeng’s eyes welled with tears as he looked at Qian Siyuan and nodded solemnly. "Tomorrow, I’ll gather the Kong family and hold a banquet to welcome you. Huaifeng has a son and a daughter, both in Jiazhou. One’s a teacher, the other’s a doctor. You cousins should meet and get to know each other."

Qian Siyuan said excitedly, "That would be wonderful! I’d love to meet them."

Listening to Qian Siyuan recount his family’s past, Zhou Yan felt a sting in his nose.

This journey of a thousand miles to find family had, in the end, come to a happy conclusion.

’The woman he had never met, Ms. Kong Simin, had lived thousands of miles away, yet her heart was always with her hometown and her motherland. It was truly admirable.’

’Qian Siyuan brought her jade pendant back to Jiazhou. If she could know this in the afterlife, she would be very happy, wouldn’t she?’

Just then, a message popped up in the corner of Zhou Yan’s vision:

[DING! Side Quest: Qian Siyuan’s Journey of Flavor and Family Roots has been completed!]

[Reward Gained: Snowflake Chicken Porridge!]

Zhou Yan: Huh?!

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