Sibu Tales : Tongyangxi童養媳 or Sing Mu Yang新婦仔

童養媳

新婦仔

Buying a young daughter in law, or getting a young girl to be a future daughter in law, was a tradition of arranged marriage dating back to pre-modern China.

In most cases, it was well arranged and even a sedan chair would be arranged to bring the young "bride" home to the village. If the child was too young, then an adult man would piggy back the child home.

This pre-adolescent daughter as a future bride for one of their pre-adolescent (usually infant) sons would be raised together. Sometimes they would be well matched, and other times, they would not get along.

 媳妇; pinyin: xífù) means daughter-in-law 

Mandarin Chinese term "tongyangxi" (traditional Chinese: 童養媳; simplified Chinese: 童养媳) means literally "child (童) raised (養) daughter-in-law (媳)" and is the term typically used as translation for the English term "child bride."

Mr and Mrs. Lau Kah Tii.

I have personally known many child brides. My own maternal grandmother Tiong Lian Tie was a child bride and so was my mother's eldest sister in law, Sia Nguik Giew.

The wife of the famous Sibu Foochow Capitan, my grand uncle, Lau Kah Tii, was also a child bride. My granduncle himself went back to Bang Dong to look for his own wife, and a wife for his brother.

We Foochows used a very fine term, "adopt a singmuyang" and not "buy a singmuyang" when they took in a child bride.

It was also a local understanding in Fujian in those days that when  Foochow families "sold off" their daughters as child brides to the Nanyang relatives they believed that they were changing their daughters' fates for the better. Very often, the men and women who came from Nanyanhg to ask for their daughters were good people, with good reputation, and mostly good Methodists. In fact no one had heard of any unpleasant stories of bad people cheating their relatives of their daughters in those days.

And upon arrival at Sibu, the Methodist Foochow community would be there to welcome the newcomers and see to their well being.