After years of searching for their relatives, two sisters who were sent to the US for adoption 20 years ago were reunited with their birth mother on Friday last week.
Mei-chi, 25, is an employee at a UN organization in India, while Rachel, 24, is a teacher in Washington.
The two sisters only found out that they were adopted four years ago, and since then they started searching for their birth mother.
Photo: Huang Chien-hua, Taipei Times
Last month, the sisters’ adoptive parents introduced the women to a trading partner in Taiwan, surnamed Hsu (許), who helped them find their birth mother by asking Taipei City Xinyi District Police Precinct investigation team leader Cheng Hung-chen (鄭宏振) for help.
The only information the sisters could provide was that their mother was surnamed Chen (陳), was about 40 years old and probably lived in Greater Kaohsiung’s Fongshan District (鳳山).
Cheng then approached Greater Kaohsiung’s police department criminal investigation corps sergeant Chang Ying-chi (張英吉) to request his help.
After a month of making inquiries, the two policemen found a woman working as a janitor at a buffet restaurant who might be the sisters’ mother.
According to the police officers, Chen got married when she was 16. Mei-chi was only a year old when her father suddenly passed away, making it almost impossible for Chen to raise two children on her own, police said.
When Mei-chi was five, Chen’s father and mother-in-law decided to allow an American family in California to adopt the sisters.
The two police officers arranged for the sisters and the woman who was thought to be the sisters’ mother to meet on Friday last week at a hotel in Greater Kaohsiung.
Despite the years apart, Mei-chi recognized Chen and confirmed that she was her mother.
Chang’s superior officer, Chiu Tung-liang (邱棟樑), said Chen and the sisters had been searching for each other for many years.
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