{"id":2505,"date":"2021-08-25T13:00:00","date_gmt":"2021-08-25T12:00:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/wp.mychinaroots.com\/?p=2505"},"modified":"2022-11-08T06:12:42","modified_gmt":"2022-11-08T06:12:42","slug":"lost-riches-facebook-family-unearths-filipino-chinese-origins","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.mychinaroots.com\/blog\/stories\/lost-riches-facebook-family-unearths-filipino-chinese-origins\/","title":{"rendered":"Lost Riches: Facebook family unearths Filipino Chinese origins"},"content":{"rendered":"\n
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Growing up in the San Francisco Bay Area, Riko Yap had no doubts about his Filipino identity. After all, his family\u2019s grocery store was the center of Filipino community life, a bustling hub for delicious meals and weekend mahjong parties.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Still, his name had always mystified him. Riko, or \u201crich\u201d in Spanish (rico<\/em>), made sense due to Spanish rule in the Philippines. Yet how in the world did he end up with Yap, a Chinese surname? He had no clue, other than his father\u2019s knowledge that \u201cgrandpa\u2019s grandpa was Chinese.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Then one night in 2012, his mother brought home a special party favor from his grand-aunt\u2019s eightieth birthday celebration: a printout of their family tree, featuring a certain \u201cPiangco Yap.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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To Riko\u2019s surprise, his family tree revealed that he is descended from one of three different branches of the same Chinese ancestor, Piangco Yap.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

\u201cIt was my first time seeing that name, even seeing our family tree go that far up,\u201d Riko recalls. \u201cApparently Piangco had three wives, one Chinese and two Filipina. How were we related? What\u2019s our connection to China?\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

This discovery rekindled the spark of curiosity that Riko once had about genealogy as a kid. In fifth grade, he had interviewed his great-grandmother for a school project. Scribbling down names and dates, he was awed at the wealth of stories she still remembered. Seeing Piangco\u2019s name, Riko remembered what he knew back then: \u201cIf I don\u2019t ask, all of this will die with her.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n

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Riko\u2019s handwritten notes from interviewing his great-grandmother in fifth grade: \u201cShe had twelve siblings! I thought that was so cool. She had a sharp mind too. She remembered all their spouses, birthdays, and children. I was able to write down her whole family tree.\u201d<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/div>\n\n\n

Reenergized, Riko swiftly took on the mantle of family historian. He mapped out eight branches on both sides of his family, compiling a family tree of over 1000 people. In the process, he reached out to any Yap he could find on Facebook, inviting them to share what they knew. Soon, Riko had gathered over 300 Yaps in a Facebook group, including relatives his family had lost touch with over time.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cIt\u2019s like a puzzle,\u201d Riko says. \u201cEach family has knowledge that others don\u2019t. Our challenge is that it\u2019s not part of Filipino culture to keep track of family history. Chinese culture has records tracking thousands of years, but most Filipinos can only go back five generations at most. We hit the point where we know we\u2019re family, but we don\u2019t know how<\/em>.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

A breakthrough finally came in 2018 when a Yap relative posted a photo of the tombstone of Gerardo Yap, a son of Piangco and his third wife. Of all the branches, Gerardo\u2019s family had stayed the most in touch with Chinese culture. Following tradition, his tombstone bore the Chinese characters of their Yap ancestral village: Puhou, a small hamlet in Fujian province.<\/p>\n\n\n

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Through the Yap Facebook group, Riko found the name of their ancestral village from a tombstone photo posted by a relative in the Philippines.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/div>\n\n\n

Now, the search was on. With the help of the online Chinoy community, Riko soon found himself connected on WeChat with officers in the official Yap clan association in Puhou. At last, he had a direct line to find possible traces of his ancestors in China.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cI was so happy! But then, I had a very hard time with the language barrier,\u201d Riko recalls. \u201cNo one spoke English, and because of the pandemic, I couldn\u2019t just go visit. That\u2019s when I reached out to My China Roots for help. I wanted you to go on my behalf.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Camera in hand and Riko\u2019s burning questions in mind, MCR researcher Chan Wai-Kwan set off for Puhou \u2013 just days before Qingming Festival, a holiday when families across China reunite to pay respects to their ancestors. Fittingly, Wai-Kwan would meet the Yap officers near the ancestral temple of Yap Sim, a heroic martyr widely revered as the common ancestor of all Hokkien Yap people.<\/p>\n\n\n

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The Hui Tek Chun Ong temple honors Yap Sim for sacrificing his life to protect the Song Dynasty emperor. In Riko\u2019s words to his friends: \u201cYou know that temple Mulan prays to? Well, I have one too. This is our Yap temple. And I found it!\u201d<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/div>\n\n\n
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