Dear Maya Shao-ming, To me, June 6, 1990 is a special day. My long-awaited dream came true the minute your father cried, "A girl!" You are more than just a second child, more than just a girl to match our boy. You, little daughter, are the link to our female line, the legacy of another woman's pain and sacrifice 31 years ago. Let me tell you about your Chinese grandmother. Somewhere in Hong Kong, in the late fifties, a young waitress found herself pregnant   by a cook, probably a co-worker at her restaurant. She carried the baby to term, suffered to give it birth, and kept the little girl for the first three months of her life. I like to think that my mother--your grandmother--loved me and fought to raise me on her own, but that the daily struggle was too hard. Worn down by the demands of the new baby and perhaps the constant threat of starvation, she made the painful decision to give away her girl so that both of us might have a chance for a better life. More likely, I was dropped at the orphanage (M JLR) steps or somewhere else. I will probably never know the truth. Having a baby in her unmarried state would have brought shame on the family in China, so she probably kept my existence a secret. Once I was out of her life, it was as if I had never been born. And so you and your brother and I are the missing leaves on a family tree. Do they ever wonder if we exist? Before I was two, I was adopted by an Anglo couple. Fed three square meals a day, I grew like a wild weed and grasped all the opportunities they had to offer--books, music, education, church life and community activities. In a family of blue-eyed blonds, though, _ . Whether from jealousy or fear of someone who looked so different, my older brothers sometimes teased me about my unpleasing skin, or made fun of my clumsy walk. Moody and impatient, burdened by fears that none of us realized resulted from my early years of need, I was not an easy child to love. My mother and I conflicted countless times over the years, but gradually came to see one another as real human beings with faults and talents, and as women of strength in our own right. Lacking a mirror image in the mother who raised me, I had to seek my identity as a woman on my own. The Asian American community has helped me regain my double identity. But part of me will always be missing: my beginnings, my personal history, all the delicate details that give a person her origin. Nevertheless, someone gave me a lucky name "Siu Wai." "Siu" means "little," and "Wai means "clever." Therefore, my baby name was "Clever little one." Who chose those words? Who cared enough to note my arrival in the world? I lost my Chinese name for 18 years. It was Americanized for convenience to "Sue." But like an ill-fitting coat, it made me uncomfortable. I hated the name. But even more, I hated being Chinese. It took many years to become proud of my Asian origin and work up the courage to take back my birth-name. That, plus a little knowledge of classroom Cantonese, is all the Chinese culture I have to offer you. Not white, certainly, but not really Asian, I try to pave  the way between the two worlds and bridge the gap for you. Your name, "Shao-ming," is very much like mine--"Shao" means "little." And "ming" is "bright," as in a shining sun or moon. Whose lives will you brighten, little Maya? Your past is more complete than mine, and each day I cradle you in your babyhood, generously giving you the loving care I lacked for my first two years. When I pat you, I comfort the lost baby inside me who still cries for her mother. Sweet Maya, it doesn't matter what you "become" later on. You have already fulfilled my wildest dreams. I love you, Mommy Why did Mommy name her daughter "Shao-ming?"
To match her own birth-name. To brighten the lives of the family. To identify her with Chinese origin. To justify her pride in Chinese culture.