Posted by Raymond (72.234.177.67) on May 23, 2008 at 20:24:39:
In Reply to: Re: Re: Help to Find Family of TEH TIAM from Amoy, China posted by Ofelai B. Te on February 01, 2008 at 05:39:47:
Ofelai,
Sorry to get back to you so late. Don't give up just yet. I have a hunch. The internet is an amazing venue for resources in tracking down information. Anyway, I was just poking around doing some searches. First of all, Amoy is now called Xiamen, and it is located in Fujian Province in China. Apparently, the Chinese surname "Teh" is more often spelled "Tay", and both are of the same Chinese character �A. Taking a look at the following website one learns that the "Tay" surname is also spelled "Zheng" in Mandarin and "Cheng
" (or even "Chang") in Cantonese romanizations, and it is ranked 21st in the most common Chinese surname in 2006:
http://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/Appendix:Chinese_surnames
Apparently, "Tay" is romanized in the Teochiu dialect and the Hokkien pronunciation of the surname, both being dominant in the area around Amoy (Xiamen) and even in northeastern portions of Guangdong Province. Also, the "Tay" surname is quite prevalent around SE Asia, and there is indication that they did indeed migrated from Amoy/Xiamen. One person mentioned "Bair Tow" (a nickname meaning "horse's head") which could very well be a "Tay" family clan area or village in Amoy.
Anyway, what does all this mean to you? Well, this offers a venue for you to do some research with the hope of finding a Tay/Teh connection in today's Xiamen. As in most Chinese enclaves around the world, there are family clan associations, each in essence binds a specific family surname to its ancestral roots. I'm assuming you're in the Philippines somewhere.... there is likely a Zheng/Cheng/Chang/Tay/Teh family association probably in Manila or Cebu. If so, you can contact or visit the association with hopes of discovering your father's name and related information among their records. Hopefully, this will ultimately lead you to his ancestral village in Amoy/Xiamen. (If there is no such family association in the Philippines, then the next obvious step would be to locate the "Tay" family association in Amoy/Xiamen which in all likelihood exists.)
Well, I hope I have helped you in pointing out what to do next......at least I hope that I have encouraged you not to give up quite yet.......
Good luck,
Raymond