曾日中 (1920-1997)

Edward Tsang (son) 曾炳均 (次子)

Baba is a great man. He was intelligent and positive. He cultivated an appreciation culture in his family. Baba was a hero to me. His smile and his warm words have burnt into my heart. Part of him is living in each of us.

Great-grandmother 莫氏 (Years unknown)	Grandfather 曾煥 1889-1972	Grandmother 蕭尤馨 (Years unknown)	Step-Grandmother 王應用 (Years unknown)	Baba 曾日中 1920-1997

A Big Family

I call my father Baba 爸爸. Baba was born in 1920, in Hong Kong. He was the eldest of the 9 children that his mother gave birth to before she died. After that, my grandfather married again. I call my step-grandmother 四嬤 (which indicated that she was the fourth child in her family). My step-grandmother produced 7 more children. For most of the time 16 people lived in a flat.

Education

Baba was very good at school, according to all my relatives. From his composition, which we discovered after he died, I can see that his English was pretty good. It was probably outstanding for his generation. He was able to use complex sentences. Some of his teachers’ corrections were wrong. Apparently his English grammar was better than his teachers’. He was also very fast in abacus. His handwriting was better than anyone else that I knew. Every Chinese New Year, he would write lucky charms (with a Chinese brush, using black ink on red paper) and put it on the walls.

He was educated in the Sun Yat-Sen University, Guangzhou (廣州中山大學), China. During the war, he followed the university to move to Yunnan. He said he studied Educational Psychology, which must have been a modern subject. I know it is.

Baba did not complete his university. He went home before his final year, only to discover that my grandmother has passed away. My grandfather told him, “what’s the point of studying? You should come and run my business with me.” Being an obedient son, he abandoned his education.

An Arranged Marriage

Baba’s marriage was arranged by my grandfather. At that time, he was in love with another woman, who was probably his classmate. But my grandfather was a very dominant figure. My mother was a peasant. Being educated, Baba must have loved to marry an educated person. In his diary, he expressed anxiety. He struggled between obeying his father and marrying some that he loved. In the end, he chose the former. It must have been heart-breaking for him and his lover.

With the difference in character and education, I don’t think my parents had much intellectual discussions. But business was so hard that they didn’t have much time together anyway. Baba often worked until 11pm.

A lot on his shoulder

Life was very hard for Baba. In the 60’s, he had to feed 16 people in the family. This includes his father, step-mother and her seven children, plus his wife and her five children at the time (and himself). All of us lived in a flat in Wanchai. The flat was probably 450 to 500 square feet. (I am not sure. Rooms tend to feel bigger when we were small.) It was partitioned into three bedrooms. Every small space was used. Luckily the ceiling was pretty high (probably 15 feet). So we were able to use bunkers and even build “Gock Zai” (閣仔 don’t know what they are called in English; beds attached to the wall above ground). I slept in a bed that was made up at night, and dismantled in the morning. It was made by putting planks on chairs. Each plank was about 18 inches wide. Two planks would make a comfortable bed. I was quite capable of sleeping on a single plank without falling in sleep. To use space more efficiently, sometimes three or four children shared a bed with four planks.

In addition to a family of 16, there were often relatives who came to stay with us from time to time. That was a common practice in those days. How are you going to tell your relatives to leave when they have nowhere to stay? I still remember the scene when one of my step-grandmother’s relatives arrived our home. He had just swum to Hong Kong from mainland China, with injuries all over the body (caused by barbed wire and dogs). There were also relatives who needed help. I remember my mother’s relatives asking for support from my mother.

Money was short. It was particularly bad in the 70's. In the worst days, Baba had to work on three jobs. One of his jobs was a cleaner. He had to get up before everyone else did, and sleep after everyone else. In those days, I was normally in bed when he returned home. He would attended to every child when he returned. He would make sure that everyone was well covered in cold nights. He would stroke us on our forehead, and say something encouraging -- whether we had fallen asleep or not.

An Intelligent, Immaculate Individual

Baba loved science and technology. He was the first one to use the telex machine in his business. This allowed him to communicate with his US suppliers faster than his competitors.

Baba was very good at his book-keeping. I remember his books, which were immaculately kept. He recorded his transactions carefully and neatly. He checked his sums repeatedly to avoid mistakes.

He was immaculate in his appearance too. He always applied hair cream to his hair. He always wore a tie when he was young. His shows were always clean and carefully polished.

Baba must have found himself rather lonely. He was highly educated, highly intelligent. Doing his business in the grocery market, people around him were mostly uneducated. I don't know if he had someone to talk to.

A Charismatic, Constructive and Calm Character

One of my father's quality was that the always looked at things positively. This is not to say that he doesn't see threats and problems. He saw those threats and problems as things that he has to handle in the context of the positive things. My elder brother has inherited this strength in my father. I wish I had learned more from them.

Being a positive person, Baba handled the cards that he was dealt calmly and positively. The amount of responsibilities on my father was immense. I don't know how he managed to cope with it. I have never seen Baba lose temper. I have never heard him sworn during my childhood. He created a happy family. He cultivated a culture of appreciation in his family. He saw merits in everyone. He was always encouraging. I have never heard him criticize any member in his family. However wrong his children did, he would only calmly state how they should have behaved. Everybody in the family listened to him. I was probably the most rebellion.