Attachment to the Jiangmen Wuyi Overseas Chinese Hometown Journey

Author: Zeng Xiaohua
Publisher:
Publish Date: 2004-01-01
Features: In 1986, I first went to the United States for business. In San Francisco, my fellow travelers and I planned to visit the Golden Gate Bridge. On the way, we asked a Chinese-looking woman for directions. Upon hearing our Xinhui accent, she happily introduced herself as "also from Sijiyi" (formerly, Jiangmen was a combination of Xinhui, Taishan, Kaiping, and Enping, known as Sijiyi, later adding Hezhou to become Wuyi). She put aside her tasks, took us to her home, and then drove us specifically to visit the Golden Gate Bridge. Along the way, many memories of Jiangmen came back to me, and I asked about the changes in my hometown. When she dropped us off at the hotel and we parted ways, we still didn’t know each other’s names. However, until now, the look of longing in her eyes for her hometown often crosses my mind. In San Francisco, there is the Gongzhou Guild Hall, where Gongzhou is another name for Xinhui. When I went to Chinatown in Manhattan, New York, it was almost like the homeland of the "Golden Mountain Uncles" overseas. The Cantonese spoken on the streets carried a strong Taishan accent. Statistics show that the total population of Wuyi in Jiangmen is now about 3.96 million, and there are 3.76 million overseas Chinese,, and compatriots from Hong Kong, Macao, and Taiwan. That’s almost another "Overseas Wuyi." I’ve been away from Jiangmen for over ten years now. Today, when I retrace this rural road, what I’m searching for may be the mountains and waters that once nurtured over 3 million overseas Chinese. It’s their watchtowers, former residences, and countless deep footprints left behind. It’s the charm of the overseas Chinese hometown, still steeped in a strong sense of local culture.