The 2005 root-searching camp of 12 American youths with Chinese origin from San Francisco arrived in Guangzhou on July 12th, 2005, beginning their root-searching journey in different cities in Guangdong, including Taishan, Kaiping, Xinhui, Nanhai, Huadu and so on. During the journey, every root-searching camper will seek for their original places and their relatives still living here or other places. The following pictures show us a vivid record of the root-searching journey of one of the campers Matthen Harrison in Huadu.

In the course of root-searching in Huadu, Matthen Harrison unexpectedly found that his uncle (his mother's brother), whom he has never met before, is living in the same city as him. Holding his uncle's picture, Matthen couldn't help smiling innocently.

A Hakka style building with three and half floors, Matthen's ancestral house has so far nearly a eighty-year history. Matthen was burning incense and worship sincerely, expressing his respest to his ancestors.

There are only about 1000 people in Luochang village, Huashan town, while over 5000 overseas Chinese in America and other countries, who have contributed a great sum of money to building quite a lot of towers and schools in their hometown. Look, Matthen was standing in front of the blackboard with the contributor's names on it, looking for his great-grandfather's name.

Matthen Harrison was burning joss sticks before his great-grandfather's grave.


Photo:Nancy                                                           Editor:Alessia, Lavinia