Gangtang's 27 years' search for his son.

 

I wonder, what does it take to feel like a father for some of us?

Well, for Guo Gangtang, 51, it took him 24 years of searching for his son, riding on his motorbike, and covering more than 500,000 across China. Yes, 24 years of unrelenting search, you heard it right. 

In 1997, Guo Zhen (Xinzhen) was abducted in front of the family home in Shandong, “where he was playing unattended...Traffickers snatched the boy and sold him to a family in central China.” He was only 2.5 years old then. 

Guo Zhen, now 26, was found via a DNA test and that ended Gangtang’s 24 years search, where he quit his job, “and criss-crossed the country on a motorbike with large flags bearing his son’s photo tied to the back.”

It is reported that “since launching a DNA database of missing family members in 2016, police said they have helped more than 2,600 individuals kidnapped as children – some more than 60 years ago – to find their biological parents.”

Mind you, the father’s search for his boy had garnered much nationwide and worldwide attention. Andy Lau even starred in a movie about Gangtang’s 24-year quest titled “Lost and Love.” 

Andy played Gangtang. And Andy was “extremely happy and inspired” to hear the news that Gangtang had found his son.It was a tear-soaking moment for Gangtang and his wife, when they hugged their son, who is now a teacher living in central province Henan. 

Gangtang exclaimed: “Now the child has been found, everything can only be happy from now on.”

It is also reported that “across the years, Guo has helped seven other families find their lost children and raised awareness about child trafficking – still a taboo topic in China.”

Lesson? One.

China’s one child policy has taken its toll on the soul of millions of parents. It has also resulted in untold pain to grieving mothers who have to standby to watch their own newborn daughter being put to death or abandoned, just so that the tradition of having a son to carry the family name would be realised, by hook, crook, or worse, infanticide. 

What’s more, by 2020, the gender imbalance was unthinkable, with 30 to 40 million surplus men. That is more than five times the population here. “In China at the time of the policy shifted to two-child policy, a staggering 119 boys were born for every 100 girls.” (The global average is 105 boys to every 100 girls). 

I write about this Nemo-like search for one’s son this morning because I can’t imagine the depth of love and devotion Gangtang had for his son, that is, in the 24 years of searching for him. He once told the Chinese media this: “Only by hitting the road looking for my son, do I feel I am a father.” 

Imagine giving up a quarter of a century of your life to embark on this quest, putting your son’s face on a flag, and travelling more than 500,000 km, without even knowing whether your baby (you knew for only 2.5 years) could ever be found. 

Imagine even further another love - if love is the right word. This time the love of another “father” who had bought your abducted son for a price and then raising him up as his very own, caring for him over the next 24 years, presumably hiding the truth from him, and refusing to come to terms with the real possibility that you as his biological father have never given up looking for him, travelling all over China, having to battle highway robbers, sleeping under bridges and even begging when your money ran out, just so as to fulfill that one wish to reunite with your only son. 

Well, juxtapositioning the two ironies together makes for such fact-is-stranger-than-fiction reality that my mind (as a father myself) cannot fully wrap around, can you? 

At this poignant moment, I came across the words of author Li Yiyun: -

“Being a mother (or father) must be the saddest yet the most hopeful thing in the world, falling into a love that, once started would never end.”

Indeed, some love is forever. Amidst the unspeakable pain is the unspeakable joy of a hope that never dies. 

Truly, I am so glad Gangtang and his son have reunited. And as he said, ““Only by hitting the road looking for my son, do I feel I am a father.” 

He is one father who never really knew his son, never saw the various milestones of growth in his young life, and was never able to touch and hug him to say “I love you so much”. In fact, that journey he took was the closest thing to fatherhood to him. And sadly, his son will never fully understand that love that never dies, but was nevertheless a love that inspired many fathers (and mothers) to never take their own child for granted. 

It is a love that reminded us daily as fathers that we should always treasure our journey with our kid, because it is a journey not solely of the imagination and hope, but one where we are fortunate enough to witness, embrace and celebrate every critical crossroad of their growth and overcoming, as one family.

 

Father Day (2021)

 

Dad knows best. Sometimes they really do. They see a need in their child, they become their rescuers. A father’s heart indeed beats with unconditional love. 

ST celebrates Father’s Day today with that theme. We have a father who gave up everything in 2014 for his son, Nathanael (Nat). Chris’ son was diagnosed with global developmental delay with low muscles tone. He researched about it and it was suggested that “living in a cool, temperate climate would be better” for Nat. 

So, Chris, who has a PhD in biology, uprooted to New Zealand with family, left a well paying job and sold his company, to care for his son full time. 

Chris said: “I made a choice: Should I be a millionaire and my son is bedridden, or should I be a poor man and my son can be perfectly fine? So I took the second option.”

Well, all that paid rich dividends for Chris. Nat is doing well. At 11 today, he has obtained a diploma in written music theory from Trinity College London’s music exam board and scored distinctions for some GCSE subjects. 

Another dad became a stay-home father for his children. He has been playing that role since 2008. He said it was the most rewarding time of his life; watching his children grow, bonding with them, as he ferried them to school in his bicycle. 

Nor Nizar Mohamed was in fact questioned for a such a move. One day, he recalled that he brought his son to play badminton. His friend asked, why he bring him over. “If you take care of him, what is your wife doing?” That was something he as a stay home dad has to deal with. 

Another dad was inspired by his own father to step up. Albert Lim’s father died when he was 33. He recalled his father fondly. Though a stoic man, he had a high sense of responsibility and was caring. “I miss his quiet caring touch unto my family.”

Albert is a volunteer with Families for Life, and a Life council member and board director at the Centre For Fathering. His own children are married and he has a granddaughter. It was a long journey of fatherhood for Albert and it is ongoing until you heave your last breath. 

Lesson? One. 

I recall E.M. Forster once said, "How do I know who I am until I see what I do?" That’s wise. 

We are defined by our actions, and I believe as fathers, we are also redeemed by them. Fatherhood is a redeeming journey. We take the first step by seeing ourselves in our child. 

We may think their struggles to crawl, to walk, and to talk differ from ours. We may think they are just beginning to live, while we are at a much later stage of that development. 

Yet, the reality is that their struggles are no different from ours. One is the birth of a life, the other, the birth of being a father. There is distinct newness on both sides as we cradle our child in our arms. We are both fragile in our own ways. The baby being nurtured and the father’s soul reformed through offering nurturance. 

And the redemption part comes when we gradually form our own identity with every step (or misstep) taken along the way. 

For that reason, both of us are learning. Both of us are growing. And both of us are adapting. That’s fatherhood, a mutually influencing and reinforcing journey from father to child, and from child to father. 

Let me end with the words of a Roman emperor, which for me describes fatherhood well.

"Some people, when they do someone a favor, are always looking for a chance to call it in. And some aren't, but they're still aware of it - still regard it as a debt. But others don't even do that. They're like a vine that produces grapes without looking for anything in return...after helping others...They just go on to something else...We should be like that." (Marcus Aurelius).

Fathers are like vines, and their labour of love asks for nothing in return; just the well-being of his child. And grapes when they are not ripe are sour, and father and child go through that journey a lot. There will surely be disappointments, stumbles and falls, even rebellion. 

That’s where the true testing comes, in line with what EM Foster said, “"How do I know who I am until I see what I do?" For when father and child overcome, one battle of growth after another, your vision of fatherhood comes into greater clarity; your identity as a father emerges from the overcoming. 

Before long, you will know who you really are, especially during such time when your child comes to you and says, “I love you, Dad.”

 

Caleb Tan and Pastor Philip Chan - Father to the Fatherless.

Caleb Tan, 46, never knew his own father. He said: “I didn’t know who my own father was. I had never experienced a father’s love.” 

He had a traumatic past. He had always felt he was born unloved. In the papers today, Lee Siew Hua reports: “(Caleb) had not only served time, but had also fled to the Philippines to escape court charges, divorced his first wife, a Filippina, and later attempted suicide.”

Caleb had also thought his mother was dead. But at 12, when he needed to apply for identity card, his grandmother (who was his sole caregiver) placed a newspaper advertisement to trace her. Caleb said: “I hated my mum a lot. Why did she give birth to me if she didn’t want me?”

Never knowing a father’s or mother’s love, Caleb spent his time in nightclubs. Before long, he was involved in fights and spent 10 years behind bars for drug dealing and other crimes. 

After he served his time, he made his way to The Hiding Place in 2010. It took some time for him to adjust and adapt. Life did not let up for him though. He later met with a serious accident and “suffered five broken ribs, a collapsed lung and burns on his body, after his short get entangled with a machine for food preparation.”

However, Caleb never gave up on life. He met Grace Sim, 46, who was working as a secretary in a church. They then married in 2018 and Grace came with two teenage sons, Jerel and Jerek (now 20 and 16). 

Imagine that, a father who had lived without a father, had to be a father to two young boys. And incidentally, today is Father’s Day and Caleb’s story is not like those familiar stories you often hear on this special day.

In fact, Caleb’s life in The Hiding Place took an unexpected turn when the late Pastor Philip Chan became a devoted father to him - as he was to many, who were drug addicts, gamblers, drinkers and wayward youth.

As Pastor Chan assured him that he would personally take care of him, in that short time, their relationship blossomed. Caleb later called him “Pa”. 

Caleb recalled that Pastor Chan gave him “unconditional love”. He also said that as a lost and struggling soul, just out of prison, Pastor Chan’s firm guidance was what he needed and had craved after. 

In 2018, before Caleb married Grace, Pastor Chan gave him this advice: “You are not marrying just Grace. She also has two sons. You have to be an example as a father.” Pastor Chan also said that he must spend time to talk and reason with Jerel and Jerek. He said: “Even if they’re your children, they have a right to talk.”

Lesson...?

Alas, in living, Pastor Chan became a father to the fatherless. He stepped up when their birth fathers walked out. And he gave them love when they neither knew love, nor the touch and hugs of a father. 

Not by genes, not by blood ties, but by love unconditional, love most transcending, beyond biology, that Pastor Chan stepped into the gap, and dedicated his life for them. 

Truly, there is no greater love than a man willing to lay his life down for another; that is, for a stranger to become a father, a father to a stranger. And that selfless love was more than enough for Caleb to love his sons in return. 

When Caleb asked his stepson, Jerel, for his blessing to marry his mother, Jerel said: “What took you so long?” And his older brother Jerek said: “I’m happy because I know you will take care of my mum.”

Caleb’s own path to fatherhood was a transforming one. He recalled: “In one tender episode, Jerek reached out to hold his hands on the way to the cinema. Shocked, (Caleb) instinctively felt like pushing it away. But in the next moment, his heart melted and he told himself: “It’s a blessing. This action was confirmation that he accepted me as a father.”

“Then in the cinema, the boy felt cold and snuggled against him, putting his head on his shoulder. “That’s a love I couldn’t have expected,” (Caleb) said.””

At times, Jerek would text him with this simple heartwarming message: “good night, love you.”

As a father myself, with three young kids, I have come to realise that you may have a hand in bringing a child into this world, but it is the journey you take with him that makes you their “Pa”. 

Every son born into this world is a father at heart. However he cannot do it alone because he needs a father before him to love him as his own, and as he is. The heart of father is like a candle, a flickering wick no less, and only the same candle can light it up so that the light of fatherhood can be passed down the line to their own children and to their children’s children. 

And the legacy of fatherhood goes beyond biological ties. It is founded on unconditional love, a love Pastor Chan exemplified so perfectly in his unfailing embrace of the broken, the vulnerable, and the disowned. 

Caleb himself experienced that love, from a man he affectionately called “Pa”. And that short journey with his pa had made all the difference for him and his sons, Jerel and Jerek. 

Let me end with what Caleb said. “I lost everything in the past. God has blessed me with a family.” And it is a family embraced and empowered by the sacred ministry of fatherhood, that is, of being a father to the fatherless, a lover to the unloved, and a candle of light against the darkness of abandonment. 

That, to me, is the timeless message on this Father’s Day. A message not only of hope, but one of enduring love.

Father kills daughter - Mental Illness is real.

“You are a selfless, loving and devoted father.” 

That’s the words of Justice Hoo when she sentenced Tan Tian Chye, 66, (“Mr Tan”) to two years and nine months in jail yesterday for killing his daughter. But taking into account that he had been in remand since 20 Nov 2018, Mr Tan was released yesterday, the same day he was being sentenced. 

This is one case where justice rightly took the road less travelled when the love of a father was pushed to the edge. It is also a case where the tragic crash of mental illness and a caregiver’s devotion ended up in a stranglehold that led to one’s daughter’s death. 

When Mr Tan strangled his daughter to death, he was diagnosed for “suffering from a major depressive episode and significant caregiver stress.” In fact, the judge noted that “Mr Tan and his wife had been on the verge of suicide as their daughter became increasingly unreasonable.”

It reports that Mr Tan and his wife did everything his daughter asked of them. They bit the bullet when she scolded them incessantly, found fault with them and even made them bow before her. Their daughter was mental ill, and was diagnosed with panic attack, when she fainted in the MRT in 2012. 

She was also diagnosed with agoraphobia (“a condition which made her anxious in unfamiliar environment”) and “hypochondriacal preoccupation”.

Here’s a rundown of what the parents have to bear, everyone of them eventually led to the last straw on that fateful day.

After the daughter was diagnosed with panic attack in 2012, she became “anxious about leaving the flat on her own and her boyfriend moved into the flat with her. She also became more particular, and would ask her parents to clean items repeatedly until she was satisfied.”

In 2017, she forced her parents to borrow from their relative so that she could apply for a BTO flat and also ”made her younger brother return $50k her parents had spent on his education.”

When she discovered she was not the sole beneficiary of her mother’s CPF nomination, she “scolded her parents until her mother changed the nomination.”

In mid-2018, she demanded her parents buy industrial fans to blow away secondary smoke coming into their flat. Subsequently, she moved out to her aunt’s place to escape the smoke. 

And according to the DPP, “(she) became more insistent and abusive, and blamed the accused and his wife for not loving her and not providing enough for her.”

Alas, the last straw came on 19 Nov 2018, “after (Mr Tan) picked her up from the aunt’s place, she told him over lunch that she felt like killing him with a fork.”

She then verbally cursed and abused her father throughout the journey. And “upon reaching home, she went to the kitchen, and (Mr Tan) picked up a metal pole to arm himself out of fear that she would harm him.”

“In the kitchen, when he saw her pointing a knife at him, he hit her with the pole and after she fell to the floor, he grabbed a cloth and strangled her with it.”

Mr Tan then called the police and told them that he had killed his daughter.

When Mr Tan heard the sentence yesterday, he thanked the judge, prosecutors and his lawyers and said: “May God bless all of you.”

Lesson? Just one. 

At the sentencing, the judge remarked that this is a sad case that could have been avoided if timely help and appropriate intervention were received by Mr Tan and his family. This is true, because at every critical intersection, the last straw is often the most unexpected one. 

As I am writing this, I have no doubt that many families can identify with Mr Tan in the same way that many could identify with the case of the father-in-law who had stabbed his son-in-law thrice on the chest for his impenitent/arrogant behaviour (which all added up and drove him off the edge) He too suffered from depression). 

Of course, the two cases can be distinguished, but my point is that the last straw is often the unseen, unplanned and unsuspecting intruder into one’s life, and it is described as a “featherweighted straw” because, most times, it doesn’t take a push of great emotional magnitude to cause one to snap, but a light nudge would suffice to change the course of one or two lives forever. 

This case is tragic because, as a father with two young daughters, I could feel his love and devotion for his daughter. Without a doubt, it was a love so compelling that one is prepared to dedicate his whole life or give his life to his daughter without any consideration. 

But to be cornered by circumstances that converged or conspired to overwhelm a father’s love until he had to act in that way speaks of a tragedy that is beyond words, beyond punishment, and beyond imagination. 

The judge said: “It is unfortunate because that much needed help, support and intervention were not sought by or given to the Tan family during those years for their daughter and, thereafter, for the accused.”

Well, let me end by saying that, as a conservative and tradition-bound nation, it is really the last resort for a father (or mother) to want to seek help due to the social stigma involved (amongst other considerations). 

And as a corollary of that is this grim reality that there is always a dark competition between what is the last resort and what is the last straw that breaks the soul and will of a “selfless, loving and devoted father”. 

Tbh, at times, who wins this dark competitive race is determined by who gets to the finishing line first, that is, it is a race between seeking help as the last resort and unwittingly allowing the last circumstantial straw to fall due to a father’s protective, if not, sometimes biased, love.

 

What kind of father are you?

Honestly, what kind of father do you want to be?

The late Michael Jackson's father, Joe Jackson (whose full name is Joseph Walter Jackson), passed away on Wednesday at 89 of pancreatic cancer. He was living in a hospice in Las Vegas.

If fatherhood has a unique blend of strictness and betrayal, Joe may just fit the bill here. 

He dropped out of high school, with parents divorced, worked as a steel worker, dabbled in boxing for a while, and also joined a R&B band before they disbanded. 

He also managed and led the Jackson Music Empire which produced the famous Jackson Five with Michael Jackson helming it and subsequently, Janet Jackson's music career also took off. 

When he broke away with Motown Records in mid-70s, that decision launched Michael's career to super stardom status. If not for that breakaway, MJ wouldn't be as successful as he is today, even in memoriam.

It was a casual start for the kids when Joe disbanded from his R&B band. He hid his guitar, afraid that his kids might damage it, but his sons found it, jammed on it and the rest is MJ history. 

But success for the Jackson came with a price. 

Although Jackson senior was strict, focused and bent on making his kids a success, which he has to be given credit for, he was also abusive and he took the opportunity to commit extramarital affairs when he toured with the Jacksons. 

His philandering ways were hardly hidden from his children and he treated it as a rite of passage for the rich and successful, an entitlement which the world should understand. It's almost like the price for fame. 

However, in 1983, led by Michael, the kids dismissed their father from being their manager and distanced themselves from him. Michael said: "It's not easy firing your father."

It reports that to the end, Joe insisted that he had raised his kids in the right way. 

He said: "I got a strict raising when I was young and I've been able to accomplished a lot because of that. And my kids have gotten a strict raising and look what they've accomplished. I think children should fear their parents."

Lesson? Well, I don't know whether kids should fear their parents, but I sure feared mine in the past. 

But my point is that fatherhood is never an easy road. The journey is twofold: marital and parenting. Both of them must be inspired by hope, fidelity and love. 

Hope that your kids are going to turn out well. Fidelity to keep keeping at it whatever the costs. And love to water the weary soul, refresh the spirit and strengthen the bond. 

Joe's experiences of fatherhood is more complicated than it seems. I do not see a point in commenting on it as different people from different perspectives may see it differently. 

Some may think that it is worth it, that is, the abuse and infidelity, if the kids turns out independent, rich and famous. 

Others may see it as highly questionable since he had broken many promises as a husband and father. In the end, his relationship with them, especially his wife, is essentially estranged. 

To me, fatherhood is much less complicated than Joe's. 

It is made up of countless of simple meals shared together with family. It is made up of unscheduled laughters, encouraging words at the right time, the holding of hands to affirm the bond, a smile of pride for the little victories and milestones overcome, rumble and tumble in the sheets for unexpected fun, a hug and a kiss to assure them of your devotion to them, and most importantly, to beat them at loving the love of their life, their mother.

Nothing about all that is about being rich and famous. For me, it is always about being truthful, honest and committed. These virtues are priceless and it takes a lifetime of stumbles as a human father to nurture and sustain them in my life. 

My philosophy is simply that you only have one life of limited span here on earth. So, what truly and enduringly counts is at its end. 

When you finally get to look back from the boundary of mortality, you want to know that you have been true to yourself, have given the best you can, have loved unceasing even when temptation is unrelenting, have never given up hope even in the worst of times, and having survey your bed death, you are surrounded by them, the ones whom you have given your life to, and they are holding your hands, hugging you with tears, and telling you repeatedly, "Daddy we love you". 

I think no fame or riches can compare to that when you finally leave this world as a very human father with all the flaws, but yet, an earnest dad with a heart that stays true, stays strong and stays hopeful. Cheerz.