My Niece (2)

When my niece grew older and became bad tempered jumping up and down crying at the top of her voice, the picture of the little good natured girl sitting on a small stool quietly for hours with her feet dangling above the floor often came into my mind. I blame my sister for my niece’s quick temper. My sister is not well educated and has no patience for child. She beat her daughter.

But this does not stop me from loving her and being proud of her. She loves animals! When she was 3 or 4 years old, on the street she saw a woman walking a dog, she ran to the dog and put her arms around the dog’s neck and would not let the dog go! Now when you visit Shanghai, you’ll see dogs everywhere, but not at that time and dogs were rare in the city then. The dog’s owner was amazed by this little girl and called her “Brave”. She let her play with the dog. Amazingly, the dog loved this strange child.

My hu*****and still remembers that day with horror. We were dating then. My hu*****and came to my home, at the door, my niece ran up to him pulling five new born kittens out of her pockets to show to him. My hu*****and jumped and the five little things fell on the floor crawling like mice. My mother laughed. My niece squatted down carefully picking up the kittens.

This year I went back to China. When I walked into my sister’s home, one dog and two cats greeted me.