Wednesday, March 21, 2007

Chinese Footbinding

On my drive in to work on Monday, I was listening to NPR and they had a story titled "Painful Memories for China's Footbinding Survivors" It was heart wrenching to learned that back in 1912, some mothers were binding their daughter's feet, crushing their tiny bones in secret so their daughters have the possibility to marry into a wealthy family. The reason for such torture sounded illogical and idiotic. As I researched more into the topic, I found this article which goes into more scary details on the actual process and pains those poor Chinese girls had to endure.
A friend of my dad's mom had binded foot and I met her in the late seventies. Back then I just thought it was strange that this grandma had the same size feet as my brother bulleye who was 6 years old at the time. I recalled that it was difficult for her to get around.
I must show share this story with my daughters when they are older so they know how lucky they are.


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