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Adeline was borned
Adeline Yen Mah was born in Tianjin, Republic of China on 30 November 1937, to Joseph Yen (Yen Tse-Rung), a businessman, and Ren Yong-ping, an accountant. -
A sign of bad luck
Two weeks after her birth, her mother died of puerperal fever and according to traditional Chinese beliefs, Adeline was branded as 'bad luck' by the rest of her family. -
Life in Tianjin
Winter, early 1942. When Adeline started kindergarten at St Joseph’s French Convent School, her Big Sister was already in fifth grade. Complaining about having to walk Adeline to and from school, Grandmother Nai Nai finally told Ah Mao, the rickshaw-puller, to take them to and from school. Adeline loved everything about school. It was a place where they were all equals and a place where unlike her own siblings, nobody looked down on her. Finally, she felt like belonged. -
A Tianjin family
The whole family (seven children, her Father and Niang, her Grandfather Ye Ye, Grandmother Nai Nai and Aunt Baba (older sister of her Father) lived in a big house in the French Concession of Tianjin (city port on the north-east coast of china) -
Arrival in Shanghai
Adeline, Big Sister and Big Brother are taken to the railroad station to meet their father. Together, the four went to the house in Shanghai. Father, Niang and Fourth Brother had been living there for one and a half years. The children are told that they are to live on the second floor (three brothers in one room, Adeline and Aunt Baba in another and Ye Ye and Big Sister in separate rooms.) The others, Father, Niang and their stepsiblings would live on the first floor in individual rooms.