Chinese ‘Son’ Is a Lesson in International Relations
The two-story white wood-frame house with blue trim is perched at the base of the foothills overlooking the Spanish mission architecture of Monrovia High School. The door on the screened-in porch bangs all day as kids trail in from school and aunts, uncles and cousins come to visit.
The family congregates in the kitchen or around the dining room table. Company is seated in the spacious living room.
It is the kind of American family most people think exists only on television. But the family of Nola and Kenneth Neeley is not exactly typical. The eldest of their six children was killed two years ago when he was struck by lightning at the age of 24.
Most people leave their dearest possessions to their families. Kenneth Robert Neeley, known to family and friends as Rob, left his parents his friend from China, Liu Ge-Yao. Now this American family has a Chinese son.
The two young men met in the spring of 1983 when Brigham Young University’s Young Ambassadors, a musical group that performs all over the world, toured China. Liu was an interpreter during the four days they were in Guangxi province, and Rob Neeley was president and co-director of the 18-member troupe.
“Rob . . . came up and talked to me,” Liu recalled. “We talked about a lot of things. We were so congenial, had a lot of common interests. We became good friends.”
During the four days they were together, the two young men discussed their families, their countries, their futures.
“I learned a lot, changed my attitudes. I had thought America was a scary country, with so much crime and wild teen-agers--that everything was terrible,” Liu said.
Now he is learning firsthand what America is like. Liu has been brought to the United States by the K. Robert Neeley Memorial Scholarship Foundation to study for his master’s degree in linguistics at BYU.
The Neeleys started the foundation in June, 1985, in memory of their son, to provide a scholarship for a Chinese student at BYU and financial assistance for further education to two performing arts students at Monrovia High School.
The Neeleys hope to expand the BYU scholarship to include students from other countries their son visited with the Young Ambassadors, such as India, Sri Lanka, Iceland, Denmark and Japan.
New ‘Son’ Arrived at Last
After much preparation and paper work, Liu arrived in California on his way to Utah last September. The Neeleys waited anxiously at Los Angeles International Airport to spend the two-hour layover with the young man they had come to call their son.
Nola Neeley wrote afterward in her journal: “. . . it was a quiet, private and tender experience I will treasure all my life . . . tears streaming down both our faces, we had finally met, a worldwide bond of love completed. . . . My heart whispered, ‘Thank you, Rob, for your Chinese brother, my Chinese son.’ ”
Liu now spends every vacation with the Neeley family. He came back for his first Thanksgiving feast, which did not impress him much, and his first Christmas, which did.
“When I first came, I thought, ‘Oh, you eat raw things,’ ” he explained, wrinkling his nose. “I never ate raw vegetables before.” Now salad is his favorite American food.
On Christmas evening, Liu wrote of his first Christmas: “What an interesting custom it is. I love this kind of tradition; it is so lovely and I love the American people, especially their sense of humor. Having taken some pictures, we all swarmed into the family room and began exchanging gifts, to be more exact, exchanging our love.”
Returned as a BYU Dancer
Liu came home again when the BYU International Folk Dancers--a different group from the Young Ambassadors--gave a benefit performance at Monrovia High School on March 22 for the scholarship foundation.
A professional ballet dancer in China for eight years, he was invited to join the folk dance group that evening for the Chinese ribbon dance and has been asked to join as a regular member next year. Liu hopes a trip with that group will enable him to visit his family in China.
Also, he was impressed with the Young Ambassadors’ performance in China.
“I had never seen American dancing and singing,” he said. “I was so excited. I knew nothing about American art.” The Young Ambassadors perform American folk and show tunes when they travel abroad, as well as some dances of the countries they visit.
“We kept clapping and clapping, and I shouted. I had never shouted at a performance like that before.”
Rob Neeley, who studied Chinese for a year before he went to China and for another year after his return, sang a popular Chinese song when they appeared there.
“The audience went crazy. They never expected an American could sing a Chinese song,” Liu said.
Studying Ballet Again
In addition to his studies at BYU, which the 28-year-old student finds more difficult than at the university in China, he is taking a ballet class.
“We didn’t know what kind of a student Ge-Yao was before we brought him over,” Nola Neeley said. “We would have brought him even if he couldn’t read. But we talked to the dean recently, and he told us Ge-Yao is one of the brightest students they have ever had.”
About 60 students from China attend BYU. One reason, according to the Neeleys, is that BYU was one of the first to send a performing group to that country. The Chinese government is encouraging students to study abroad to help improve technology in science and agriculture especially, explained Liu, who graduated from the Guangxi Teacher’s University with a degree in English.
Liu’s father is the head of the Chinese language department at the university, and his mother is an accountant. He is the middle child with two sisters. He was taken out of school as a child to become a dancer, as is the custom in many countries if a child is talented in a particular area.
His younger sister, who also has a degree in English from the university, encouraged Liu to attend college and helped him complete four years of high school work in one year in preparation for the university.
‘Wonderful Things Happened’
A handsome young man with a ready smile, he hopes to teach when he returns to China.
“I think I am going to tell my people that though the systems are different, there are a lot of nice people in the United States,” he said. “I will tell them about the American family and love. A lot of wonderful things have happened here.”
“This all started with two creative, talented, friendly young men,” said Kenneth Jensen of Pasadena, Nola Neeley’s cousin. “It shows what can be done by an American family.”
The Neeleys hope to travel to China someday to meet Liu’s family.
“We will sit in the back of his classroom and heckle him,” Kenneth Neeley bantered.
“That would be totally awesome,” Liu said to his new father.
Among the things the young men discovered they shared during their four days together was a desire to be a father with a sense of humor--”like my dad,” Liu recalled Rob Neeley saying.
“We were in a handicraft store on the third day and he asked me if I had a girlfriend,” Liu said. They shared pictures of their girlfriends and talked about the families they would have.
Exchange of Names
Neeley and Liu wrote one another regularly before Neeley was killed in June, 1984, in Provo, Utah. Neeley’s Chinese teacher had told the students to find Chinese names, so not long before he died, he wrote Liu asking him to find one for him. Liu said he thought about it for two days, trying to find a special name that was both meaningful and beautiful. Finally he decided it would be Luo Te Li, meaning Rob is extremely lucky.
“He was so happy, so outgoing. It suited him,” Liu said.
The other day, Nola Neeley gave Liu his American name--Joseph.
“In the Bible Joseph means God shall add sons, and He gave us another son,” she said. “Also Joseph traveled far to a strange land where he was loved by the people.”
In the last letter Neeley wrote to Liu, which he never mailed, he thanked his friend for “such a nice name.”
Then he explained why he felt he was indeed lucky: “In the world where borders and languages and governments divide people, I have a friend and we have transcended those barriers.”