Adventures in China

What is a child? How should a child be treated? When does a child grow up?

These questions are answered as inconsistently in China as they are in the United States. In some ways, it seemed like children had to grow up faster than they do here. Children were expected to sit at attention in classrooms for long periods of time. One of the boys I knew (from a small village) had cooked all of his family's meals starting at the age of 13. Children seemed to be expected to handle themselves as adults in public very early on. People would even send their children to boarding school at the age of 3, if they thought it would put them ahead in life.

At the same time, children seemed overly protected and spoiled, especially in the middle and upper classes. Most children lived at home until they were married and were still treated as children well into their 20's. Sometimes, the married couple had to live with their parents until they could find another place to stay. During this time, many of them never learned to cook and were only taught once they were married and moved out. Their parents often took care of all expenses and planning, allowing their children an extended childhood in those ways.

Everyone was always impressed at our young age for traveling abroad (21 for me and 23 for my friend) that seemed very natural to us. People would always stress how independent we were for traveling alone, especially at our age. They would also stress how hard it must be to be away from our families, though we had both lived away from home for 4 years of university.

I think the protective model of parenting is more standard because the one child per family policy has made children very precious, though there will always be people who don't bind very closely to their children. In general, children seem very well attended to - newborns seem to sleep with their parents for years and never seem to be set down until they are toilet trained. If the mother is tired, there is always another relative there to hold the baby. And that baby seems to get that close circle of protection for the rest of its life.