Hong Kong Young Writers Anthologies Fiction Group 3 - 2017 | Page 482

but I have something else to promise to you. That I love you forever, you are one of the best things that ever happened to me. Thank
you. Jia Lin, you will learn, and grow. Be brave, my little one.”
I am crying my heart out at the end of the letter, touched by every single word. In the little box is the pocketwatch, the one
that brought hope to little Grans. I do remember my favourite story. Grandmother’s family was a wealthy family, her father a
general for the Chinese army. The Japanese invaded China, the battle in our hometown, Shanghai. Grandmother said the streets
were bathed in blood, corpses strewn everywhere. During the battle, her father died, her mother was take n by the Japanese, her
brothers recruited to join the army. Grandma was forced to live with her aunt, whom lived in a small village. Grans survived the
war, but her mother, father and brothers didn’t. Granny loved to tell these stories, she wanted to let us know that these skyscrapers
that populate Shanghai didn’t always use to be like that. There is history, it demands to be heard.