The tragedy of gendercide – and the wonder of friendship
“In China and northern India more than 120 boys are being born for every 100 girls. Nature dictates that slightly more males are born than females to offset boys’ greater susceptibility to infant disease. But nothing on this scale.”
This is a quote from a feature in “The Economist” which suggests that worldwide at least 100 million girls that should have been born were aborted and that, as a result:
“China alone stands to have as many unmarried young men—“bare branches”, as they are known—as the entire population of young men in America.”
Some 35 years ago, in the Chinese city of Wuhan, the Ye family had a baby daughter and called her Hua. She was so clever that she went to university in Dalian and obtained a degree in chemical engineering before, at the age of 25, leaving China for the first time to fly to Britain and start a PhD in bio-chemical engineering in Oxford.
On the flight of more than 10 hours, my wife and I – returning from a holiday in China – befriended Hua and, from that conversation, came a friendship in which Hua became like a daughter to us. Ten years later (and still resident in Britain and now a lecturer at Oxford), she is married to Zhihao, who is like a son to us, and they have a wonderful three-year old son called Joshua, who is like a grandson to us.
The five of us are about to return to China together in a trip that will enable Vee and I to see China through Chinese eyes.