First of all, I’ve decided not to use names of family members in the blog, partly for generic reasons of privacy–plus, knowing names won’t necessarily add that much to the story for you–but also because there could be too many names for you to keep track of. Therefore, I’ll name everyone by their relationship to me, such as “My Wife,” “My Mother-In-Law,” “My Wife’s Younger Sister’s Husband,” and so on.

It’s more typing for me to do this, but this is China, where relationships are everything anyway, so that’s the nomenclature we’re going to go with. (And thanks to those of you who know us personally for not mentioning names if you leave comments.)

GENERATION ONE

My Father-In-Law passed away in 2001; my Mother-In-Law is about 61 years old.

GENERATION TWO

My Wife’s Elder Sister is about 35. She divorced a few months ago, so I guess I won’t have too many anecdotes about “My Wife’s Elder Sister’s Husband.”

My Wife is 33. I, the foreigner in this Chinese family, am 39.

My Wife’s Younger Sister is about 31; her husband is the same age.

My Wife’s Younger Brother is 29–and eligible, ladies. He’s had lots of introductions to potential wives, but hasn’t fallen for any of them yet. He still lives here in Anhai, but I think he has other places in mind. Good guy, nearly American (in the good way) in his sensibilities.

GENERATION THREE

My Wife’s Elder Sister has a 7-year-old son.

My Wife and I have two Daughters, ages 2 and 4.

My Wife’s Younger Sister and her Husband have a Daughter, age 5.

I expect to add more anecdotes and information about everyone during our visit here, so we’ll leave the descriptions at that for now.

A few words on the notable absences in this family tree.

My Father-In-Law passed away (heart attack) in 2001, the day after returning from Guangzhou, having successfully obtained a visa to come visit us in Seattle. He and my Mother-In-Law were going to leave just a few days later for the U.S. to be there for the birth of our first Daughter, who was born three weeks later.

My Wife’s Younger Sister had twins five years ago, a boy and a girl, but the boy died less than two weeks later.

And I already mentioned my Wife’s Elder Sister’s recent divorce.

There are, of course, stories behind each of these absences; maybe I’ll find time for some of them during our visit.

We haven’t all been together since March of 2000. This Chinese New Year, we’ll be getting used to some absences and some new little faces at the festival table.