In Pursuit of Images and Shadows A Chinese Daughter's Search for her Adoptive Mother's Past - A work in progress: Introduction

In 1994 my (adoptive) mother, Elsa Oiesen Bement, passed away at the age of 94. I inherited a rich legacy: memories of a loving relationship, fifty-two years of shared adventures and life experiences, and the belief that one could achieve anything, if sufficiently motivated. In addition, my mother left me two unexpected gifts that played a critical role in the pathway I eventually would choose: an envelope bearing the words, "to be read after my death," and a bulging suitcase hidden away in the storage room of the Tuscan farmhouse where she had lived since 1970. The envelope contained a six-page letter, started in 1968, shortly after my wedding and added to throughout the years. The last entry was dated 1992. It was a love letter from my mother in which she thanked me for the joy I had brought her. She claimed that I had been the "perfect" daughter (far from the truth), rejoiced over the birth of my children, and reminded me to always follow my intuition. But that was not all: tucked away in a small yellow envelope, I came across a tattered map of the main cemetery in Copenhagen. A bold X marked the site of my grandfather's grave.

Sometime later, while sorting through trunks and boxes, I uncovered my mother’s final bequest. From the time I had set off from Florence, my home from 1957-1962, to attend the University of Geneva, I had tried to maintain a weekly correspondence with my mother, (essentially ten to eleven months out of the year). The bulging suitcase concealed thirty-two years of letters arranged according to date and neatly bound together with colored ribbons: a detailed record of more than half my life. I do not plan to draw from my own letters for this book; in fact, I may never make use of them, but the message from my mother was unequivocal. Despite my passion for teaching, she always assumed that I would ultimately become a writer. I now had a clear mandate. Setting aside a thirty-two-year-long academic career, with considerable trepidation I embarked upon a course of full-time research and writing.

At first, I set a modest goal: unable to let go of the only mother I had ever known and loved, I envisaged compiling a biography of her colorful life. It became clear within a few months, however, that it would be senseless to isolate her tale from the history of her siblings and parents. Naively, I believed at the outset that I held all the threads of the family story within my grasp. I was convinced that I had the makings of a compelling tale featuring an unusual cast of characters, two generations of a biracial, bicultural family, part Danish, part Chinese whose historical background dated back to the mid-eighteen hundreds. I counted on a felicitous blend of dramatic, tragic, poignant and comic stories to keep the reader involved. With a vast collection of family letters, documents, photographs and first person accounts at my disposal, I had a veritable treasure trove from which to draw. Yet, as the project began to take shape, I discovered that some indefinable element was missing; the primary sources simply weren't sufficient. Two powerful forces swept me along, adding to a sense of urgency as time was of the essence: my intellectual curiosity and scholarly training, and a profound need for a spiritual connection with my mother's past. I have haunted libraries from the Boston area, Northampton, New York City and Washington, DC, to London, Paris, Copenhagen, Shanghai, Nanjing, Beijing, Bornholm, and Seoul, both to confirm what I already knew and to search for greater cultural and historical insights. My hunger for more family stories and a deeper understanding of the people and events involved, have transformed me into a resourceful investigator, a consummate detective. Driven by instinct and intuition, assisted by serendipity or fate, I have pursued unlikely clues that have led to startling discoveries and secrets laid buried for close to a century.

Most adoptees yearn to find out about their biological origins. In my case, I loved my (adoptive) mother so deeply that, after her death, I had to find a means of keeping her alive in my every day life. This urge led me to my ongoing 12-year-long search for connections to her past and a memoir in progress. Perhaps the fact that Mother was half Chinese and shared her childhood memories of growing up in China until age 11, created an overlap. In searching for connections to her past, I found myself visiting China for the first time in 1998, and thus discovering my ancestral land.

In answer to Sabrina’s well-formulated question, I can only say that I find it impossible to conceive of a more loving, supportive, or inspiring parent. I consider myself infinitely fortunate and blessed. Later in life, I developed the desire to find out anything I could about my birth parents. The facts surrounding my adoption were shrouded in ironclad secrecy. I have faced innumerable hurdles and false trails in my ongoing search.

Beyond sheer curiosity, what has given me the energy and courage to face challenge after challenge in my twofold search, has been the compelling need to fully belong, not just to my immediate family, but to be able to embrace and become part of my extended families and their cultures, on both sides. Did the urge stem from a sense of loss? A comprehensive answer would be complex and multilayered, but I can state unequivocally that I mourn the loss of the mother who lovingly raised me, as well as the loss of the mother who carried me in her womb for 9 long months. I also celebrate them both and am grateful to have had two mothers.I speak from the perspective of someone approaching her 7h decade who has two beloved children, now adults, but still as close, if not closer than in their early years. Above all else, I treasure my family, the children I bore, the many children I have acquired informally, my "siblings" in spirit and the ghosts of all my ancestors, adoptive or biological, known directly, through stories, anecdotes, or my vivid imagination. My wish for my new family members of One World is that, in time, if not now, you will savor the same emotional richness.

With much love, Mei-Mei