{"id":447,"date":"2018-08-04T22:42:53","date_gmt":"2018-08-05T05:42:53","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/bruceramsey.net\/?page_id=447"},"modified":"2025-07-20T20:29:00","modified_gmt":"2025-07-21T03:29:00","slug":"a-hong-kong-baby-1991","status":"publish","type":"page","link":"https:\/\/bruceramsey.net\/index.php\/a-hong-kong-baby-1991\/","title":{"rendered":"A Hong Kong Baby (1991)"},"content":{"rendered":"\t\t
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Mother and son<\/p>\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t<\/section>\n\t\t\t\t

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\u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0\u00a0\u00a0In three and a half years at Asiaweek I had two bylined pieces. This was the first, published May 31, 1991, in a short-lived front-of-the-book section devoted to personal accounts.<\/span><\/i><\/p>\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t<\/section>\n\t\t\t\t

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\u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0\u00a0\u00a0I had my first hint of what was to come when my pregnant wife asked for a black-skinned chicken. I had seen one in Lima, Peru. A Chinese grocer proudly showed us birds that had been brought all the way from Guangdong province. He was breeding the chickens on his roof. They had odd, white-feathered legs and black feet\u2014too scrawny for a proper meal. He said their meat was medicinal.<\/span><\/p>

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0Since then we had moved to Hong Kong, a place foreign to me but home to my wife Annie. We wanted exciting jobs, a faster pace and a chance for her to be with her family after 15 years in the States. We had just learned she was pregnant with our first child. I wondered what it would be like to have this baby in Hong Kong\u2014and what it meant that my wife wanted to eat a black-skinned chicken.<\/span><\/p>

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0I had thought of her as Westernized. She had attended university in the States, built her career there and taken out U.S. citizenship. She considered herself part-American, and\u00a0\u00a0went into this pregnancy intending to do most things the American way. But she quickly found that her family, friends and co-workers had no such idea. She was Chinese. If she was unsure of the proper things for a pregnant woman to do, they would let her know.<\/span><\/p>

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0She remembered black-skinned chickens from her youth. She had seen them eaten by expecting mothers. So she did the same. She went to the wet market, selected a live bird, and took home a plucked carcass that looked like it had been rolled in ash. She boiled it with ginger for a long time and drank the juice. She did it partly for the novelty. It was a rite of passage, something she had earned.<\/span><\/p>

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0For her prenatal care, we chose a modern Chinese obstetrician who had an ultrasound scanner and up-market clientele. His advice: no drugs and no cigarettes. \u201cAnd no Chinese herbs.\u201d Annie could \u201ceat like an English lady.\u201d But from family and friends came contradictory rules: no shrimp or lobster. Shellfish would give the baby bad skin. No hot curry. Only a little ong choy<\/em>. And definitely no mangoes. They would give the baby a skin rash.<\/span><\/p>

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0I intended to be tolerant. But unborn babies injured by mangoes? Did my wife really believe that? To her, it was a matter of prudence: \u201cMaybe it\u2019s just old wives\u2019 tales, and maybe there\u2019s something to it. I don\u2019t want to risk it.\u201d It was the same with Indian curry: Spicy food was \u201cbad for the baby.\u201d<\/span><\/p>

I argued back. \u201cAll these mangoes come from the Philippines. If they were bad for unborn babies, why don\u2019t all the Filipinos have skin problems?\u201d I thumbed through my Asiaweek<\/em>. \u201cAnd look here. There are 842 million Indians. How did there get to be so many, if curry interfered with childbearing?\u201d But in this struggle, temptation worked better than logic. Annie loves mangoes. I bought a ripe one: \u201cTry this.\u201d When she ate it I was relieved. Later, we shared a plate of pungent Punjabi curry. But she didn\u2019t eat very many of either, that year.<\/span><\/p>

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0The Chinese, I discovered, had other customs about newborns. One is never to say good things, because they bring just the opposite. It\u2019s safer to something negative, which everyone knows you don\u2019t mean. The younger generation doesn\u2019t do this much anymore, but old folks do. Mother to grandmother: \u201cThis is your naughty grandson.\u201d Grandmother to mother: \u201cHit him.\u201d<\/span><\/p>

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0One custom that survives in Hong Kong is the pickling of pig\u2019s knuckles and whole ginger in black vinegar. This concoction is begun before the birth, in a clay pot that barely fits on the stove. It takes a month to prepare, and people don\u2019t bother to do it except on this one occasion. The output, a delicacy,\u00a0\u00a0looks like stones in motor oil.<\/span><\/p>

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0Next is the red-eggs party. When the baby is one month old, the parents throw a banquet. They bring the infant, and on each table they set a plate of red-colored boiled eggs. Around his neck and wrists dangle golden baubles given by the family. Everyone passes red envelopes of cash\u2014lai see<\/em>\u2014to the parents.<\/span><\/p>

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0Modern red-eggs parties are held in big restaurants and hotels. The banquets are lavish, but little is left of the ritual. Decades ago the Chinese kept the baby swaddled in rags until the one-month party, when they dressed him up in scarlet robes. They also shaved his scalp, and hung a little mirror on his forehead to ward off evil spirits.<\/span><\/p>

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0Another custom was that the mother didn\u2019t wash her hair for the first month. In Hong Kong the practice still survives: The pillows in the maternity ward stink.<\/span><\/p>

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0When Annie began breastfeeding, she was subject to more dietary rules. I brought her a bowl of wontons; a relative advised her not to eat them. Wontons had shrimp that would get in the milk and hurt the baby\u2019s skin. Liver was bad, too. It would retract the milk. (Fish and papaya soup would stimulate it.) And when I brought her a cup of mango juice, colleagues visiting from her office warned her (in Chinese, so I wouldn\u2019t understand it): \u201cDon\u2019t! You know better than that.\u201d<\/span><\/p>

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0I waited for our Chinese obstetrician to make his daily rounds. He had forbidden coffee and tea. How about mango juice? Would that hurt the baby?\u00a0<\/span><\/p>

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0He couldn\u2019t believe I was asking this. \u201cYou mean feeding the baby mango?\u201d\u00a0<\/span><\/p>

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u201cNo, feeding Annie. And that hurting the baby through the milk.\u201d<\/span><\/p>

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u201cAbsolutely not. Ridiculous.\u201d The twinkle in his eye seemed to say, \u2018I know what you\u2019re up to.\u2019 But his other patients believed these things, and also told Annie not to drink mango juice.<\/span><\/p>

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0Day after day the food I brought my wife was being condemned as harmful. Only one said it in English. I had proposed buying a tub of Kentucky Fried Chicken, and she said: \u201cYou\u2019d better not. It could be a rooster. What she needs is the meat of a hen. It\u2019s milder.\u201d I was getting sore, but Annie\u2019s tolerance ran out first. Being torn between me and all her other visitors was too much. \u201cI\u2019m going to eat what I want,\u201d she said. \u201cRight now I want a cup of tea.\u201d<\/span><\/p>

\u00a0<\/span><\/p>

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0I had my own ideas about how babies should be born. I should comfort my wife through her labor pains so that she wouldn\u2019t need drugs. I should witness the delivery, and perhaps even cut the umbilical cord. The newborn should be placed at the mother\u2019s breast. Afterward, the baby would be in her room, and be fed with mother\u2019s own milk.<\/span><\/p>

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0This was the \u201cnatural\u201d way portrayed in all the books from Britain and the States. But in Hong Kong my ideas seemed oddly provincial. \u201cNatural\u201d is folkish, earthy and backward. It\u2019s spitting on the ground and dressing your infant in slit pants instead of diapers. It\u2019s what the peasants do across the fence in China. Peasants breastfeed; modern women use formula, which can be mixed by the Filipino maid. \u00a0Few Hong Kong women nurse their infants, and they never do it in public.<\/span><\/p>

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0I recalled some letters to the\u00a0South China Morning Post\u00a0<\/i>in which a woman said that she had attempted to breastfeed her baby in the coffee shop of the Mandarin Hotel. The headwaiter ordered her out. She would have to feed the infant in the women\u2019s toilets. \u201cI was shocked and offended,\u201d she wrote, describing public breastfeeding as something that \u201ccauses offense only to the uneducated and small-minded.\u201d Of course, she was a foreigner.<\/span><\/p>

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0The private Chinese hospital where our obstetrician sent us allowed a mother to hold her infant only if she was breastfeeding. Otherwise she could peek through a window for two minutes, and move aside for somebody else. In no case could a mother take her baby to her room. For me, the rule meant no chance to touch my son for at least a week.<\/span><\/p>

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\u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 I was sore about that. I thought it was outrageous, and so did Annie. We conspired to subvert it. A colleague who had given birth at the same hospital advised Annie to sneak our son out of the breastfeeding room when the nurse wasn\u2019t watching. I could hold him. I was the father; I had the right to hold my son. We did it, too, and I took a photo. The nurse found out and was horrified. Germs! Infection! She threatened to bar Annie from breastfeeding if we did it again.<\/span><\/p>

\u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0The big issue for me was the birth itself. I wanted a natural childbirth, and told the doctor months before. I also want\u00aded to witness it and take pictures. My friends in the States had brought video cameras into the birthing room and filmed the whole delivery to show on their TVs. No way could I do that at this hospital. I think the doctor considered the idea disgusting.<\/span><\/p>

\u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0He said a natural delivery was possible. But as the months rolled by, I began to worry. Not because of any medical complications, but from the stories I heard. Suddenly I took an interest in babies, and asked other people in Hong Kong\u2014Chinese and foreigners\u2014about theirs. They had been to different hospitals and doctors. Nearly all had given birth by C-section.<\/span><\/p>

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0No Lamaze class was available at our Chinese hospital, so we signed up for one at an American hospital. There a group of Hong Kong people (many who had lived abroad), Japanese, Koreans and Americans went to learn the controlled-breathing techniques for natural childbirth.<\/span><\/p>

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0We also listened to a talk by a Chinese obstetrician who had practiced in the States. He seemed very open. During the question period I asked him, \u201cWhat\u2019s our chance of a Caesarean section? What are the statistics in Hong Kong?\u201d Suddenly he was defensive. \u201cI know we hear a lot about C-sections in Hong Kong. But it\u2019s not as if doctors just do them because they want an extra fee, or because they\u2019re tired of waiting. They\u2019re done when there\u2019s a medical reason.\u201d That was better than in the U.S., he said, where doctors operated to protect themselves from malpractice lawsuits.<\/span><\/p>

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0This doctor had heard people say the percentage of Caesareans in Hong Kong was one-third. He didn\u2019t think it was that high, absolutely not, but he didn\u2019t know what it was. Later I tried to find out how high it was. The territory keeps statistics on all sorts of things, from infant mortality (better than the U.S.) to workers\u2019 wages. But not on C-sections.<\/span><\/p>

\u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0Certainly the surgery is not always done for medical reasons. I knew of a vice-president of an American bank whose wife had scheduled a Caesarean so that their son could be born on August 28 at 8:28 a.m. In Cantonese \u201c2-8\u201d means \u201ceasy to prosper.\u201d A child born at 8:28 on 8-28 has a head start on the road to riches. Providing such advantages was common practice, just like paying a premium for lucky car plates like \u201c2888.\u201d<\/span><\/p>

\u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0\u00a0\u00a0Annie overheard a woman in our doctor\u2019s waiting room expressing worry because her fetus was small. \u201cSo much the better,\u201d a man with her said. \u201cYou\u2019ll have a smaller scar.\u201d<\/span><\/p>

A C-section has become a kind of status symbol in Hong Kong. It shows that you have money, and can pay to avoid the pain. You can schedule your child\u2019s birth into your appointment book. It is surgical, modern and convenient. Even the scar can be hidden by a two-piece bathing suit. And for the private physicians saving up for a move to Vancouver before 1997, it offers an operating fee of about $650.<\/span><\/p>

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0Our obstetrician, recommended by Hong Kong relatives, had delivered a niece and nephew by C-section. Sure, he said, he would try for a natural childbirth if we wanted one. Were we attending the classes? Very good, yes. But of course, if an operation was medically necessary, it would have to be done. What were the chances? I said. Well, he couldn\u2019t say. It depended on the size of the head and the baby\u2019s position. It was too early to tell.<\/span><\/p>

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0As the due date neared, he grew more positive. Natural delivery was now \u201cquite likely\u201d because there had been no complications. The Chinese hospital that he used had a rule against fathers witnessing the birth, but it was \u201cprobable\u201d that he could arrange an exception for us.<\/span><\/p>

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0All the baby books with the glowing accounts of natural childbirth said not to go to the hospital until labor was clearly underway. We were to ignore the two earlier signs, the show of blood and breaking of waters. Our doctor said the opposite. We were to come immediately at either of the earlier signs.<\/span><\/p>

\u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0We did. Right away he broke the waters and used an injection to induce labor\u2014hard, severe contractions. I had never heard of such a practice, but here it was routine. As for me, I was on the doctor\u2019s turf, now. It was the middle of the night. I could not be in the labor room because there was a rule against it; I could not wait in the lobby because it was night. The maternity ward was closed at 9 p.m.\u2014see the sign? So I had to go home.<\/span><\/p>

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0Go home? My wife is having a baby and I\u2019m to go home?<\/em> Yes. The doctor would telephone me if I could come and see my son\u2019s birth. That depended on whether the head came down, which it hadn\u2019t yet. I could witness the birth only if it was natural. And only if the chief nurse allowed it\u2014and the doctor said of the one on duty: \u201cEven I am afraid of her.\u201d<\/span><\/p>

\u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 Annie was in pain four hours, most of it alone. At 1:30 a.m. the doctor called me. The head had not gone down; it was molding out of shape and putting the baby under stress. \u201cI think now is the time to end it,\u201d he said. He wanted my permission to administer a general anesthetic and operate.<\/span><\/p>

\u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 I thought he should have waited for labor to start naturally instead of inducing it with drugs. The head probably would have come down, and not been pounded against a half-opened door. His method forced the pace, and if the body didn\u2019t keep up, zip!<\/em>\u2014a C-section. But none of that was relevant any longer. Was I willing to second-guess the doctor now? No. \u201cOkay,\u201d I said. \u201cGo ahead.\u201d<\/span><\/p>

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0Morgan Drake Ramsey was born the Hong Kong way\u2014a quick cut, and into the world. There are no videos of his birth, and no snapshots. Nor did either his mother or father witness it. These things, which were so important to us at the time, quickly slipped into the past. Certainly it didn\u2019t matter to him.<\/span><\/p>

\u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0Following instructions from the baby\u2019s aunts, his Filipino nanny Janet made a pot of pickled ginger and pig\u2019s knuckles that looked like stones in motor oil. It was pronounced excellent by all who tried it. She had to brew up a second batch\u2014a good omen for our son, people said. The more people who took his ginger, the more likely he would be an obedient boy.<\/span><\/p>

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0On his one-month birthday, we threw a red-eggs party in a private room at a restaurant. We decked our wriggling infant in a gaudy outfit and hung the family\u2019s gold baubles around his neck. Aunts and uncles brought their kids, and the room filled with talk and the clatter of mahjong tiles. Then we tucked into the shark\u2019s-fin soup, roast pigeon and suckling pig, and collected more than $200 in red packets for Morgan\u2019s first bank account.<\/span><\/p>

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0After the party, relatives came to see our son. Typical of the older generation was Little Aunt from Chai Wan. \u201cOoooh, isn\u2019t he ugly?\u201d she said. \u201cSkinny, too.\u201d But she said it in Chinese. All I could tell is that she had said something nice, and that Annie was beaming with pride.<\/span><\/p>

\u00a0<\/span><\/p>

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0Two Hong Kong Chinese women wrote me. One was sympathetic, but the other took offense at my line about \u201cstones in motor oil.\u201d Well, I expressed some annoyance of things Asian, and I wasn\u2019t too sure Asiaweek would print it.\u00a0\u00a0But the editors didn\u2019t see it, and I wasn\u2019t going to point it out to them<\/span><\/i>.<\/span><\/p>\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t<\/section>\n\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t<\/section>\n\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Mother and son \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0\u00a0\u00a0In three and a half years at Asiaweek I had two bylined pieces. This was the first, published May 31, 1991, in a short-lived front-of-the-book section devoted to personal accounts. \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0\u00a0\u00a0I had my first hint of what was to come when my pregnant wife asked for […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"parent":0,"menu_order":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","template":"","meta":{"footnotes":""},"class_list":["post-447","page","type-page","status-publish","hentry"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/bruceramsey.net\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages\/447","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/bruceramsey.net\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/bruceramsey.net\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/page"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/bruceramsey.net\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/bruceramsey.net\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=447"}],"version-history":[{"count":8,"href":"https:\/\/bruceramsey.net\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages\/447\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1590,"href":"https:\/\/bruceramsey.net\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages\/447\/revisions\/1590"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/bruceramsey.net\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=447"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}