Sitting at her desk in her study room, the 82-year old Cheng Chew scrolled the mouse of her computer to review her memoir, “My Stories”.
It was a book she wrote to pay tribute to her love, her sacrifices, and her strength as a mother who travelled across oceans from Malaysia to the USA to pursue better future lives for her younger generations.
Adrift at Sea, A New Life Begins
Born in Fuzhou China, Cheng Ling’s world collapsed when her family was considered to be “Capitalists” by the Communist Government in China during 1950’s.
Her mother, together with her 3 children, escaped to Malaysia to reunite with her father in Malaysia.
After drifting in a small boat in the South China Sea for about a month, they finally arrived in Singapore and then got transported to Penang Malaysia to reunite with her father.
Cheng Chew grew up in Penang Malaysia & she attended Malaysian Teachers’ College in Kuala Lumpur Malaysia.
After graduating from the Teachers’ College, she taught Mathematics and Science in a High School in Kuala Lumpur Malaysia for 5 years before she quit to bring her children to join her husband in the USA.
In 1970’s, the racial tensions between the Malays and the non-Malays in Malaysia were worrying.
For her children’s futures, Cheng & her husband decided to leave Malaysia.
The only way for them to leave was for her husband to apply to go overseas for further studies and her family would be able to follow her husband to go overseas.
And he needed to get some financial aids in order to be able to go overseas for further studies.
Her husband applied to enroll in the Doctoral Programs in the UK, Australia, and the U.S.
In 1970, her husband was able to get a Teaching Assistantship to study Doctoral Degrees from the University of South Carolina in Columbia South Carolina USA.
With that modest stipend, Cheng and her children were still able to move to the USA to join her husband.
She was 27 years old at that time.
Mother’s Needle, Children’s Futures
In 1971, Cheng brought her daughter with her and moved to Columbia South Carolina USA.
They lived in the low cost housing apartment with a free daycare center to take care of her daughter.
After settling down in the apartment, few months later, her husband went back to Malaysia to bring her son over to join the family.
They had a very happy family reunion at the low cost apartment in Columbia South Carolina.
Living in a low-income neighborhood, unable to teach and spoke little English, Cheng Chew took the only job she could find and she was able to do at that time—sewing in a garment factory for $1.10 an hour.
“There were times I didn’t think I could go on!” she said.
“My husband’s support kept me going.” While she worked overtime on weekends, he cared for the children.
In the hum of sewing machines, a mother’s love became strength—stitched into every seam.
White Coat, Steady Heart
In 1974, after her husband got a teaching job at the University of Kentucky, Cheng Chew turned her focus to building future for herself and for her family.
Told by a student advisor at the University of Kentucky that hospitals in the USA were in urgent need of surgical nurses, and that nurses were easy to obtain permanent Residency Status.
Cheng Chew threw herself into learning English and enrolled in the Nursing school at the University of South Carolina in Columbia South Carolina.
Three years later, at age 35, she became the first Chinese surgical nurse at St. Joseph Hospital, the oldest hospital in Lexington Kentucky.
Her dedication stood out. She was chosen the Nurse of the Year in 1994 and promoted to be the Head Nurse of the surgical ward in the hospital.
She managed a team of about 50 nurses in the surgical ward.
In 1986, she represented St. Joseph Hospital in Lexington Kentucky to visit the Medical Hospital in Beijing China and in 2008 she also returned to her alma mater in Penang Malaysia to promote health education.
Along the way, Cheng had received many Honorable Awards from different Institutions that she had helped over the years : to express their gratitudes and their appreciations for Cheng Chew.
Loss and Renewal
On Christmas Eve in 1994, Cheng Chew and her husband took a trip to New York. Originally they intended to spend the Holidays with their families in NYC.
The weather turned snowy as they drove towards the North. And the snow turned into ice as they approached the Pennsylvania Turn Pike.
Their car skidded on ice and it hit hard against the guard rails of the highway on the passenger side.
Her husband on the driver’s side was fine whereas Cheng Chew, on the passenger side, suffered from severe devastating injuries.
She ended up with amputation of her left leg below the knee at the Allegheny Hospital in Pennsylvania.
After staying at the Allegheny Hospital for a week, Cheng Chew’s Hospital, the St. Joseph Hospital at Lexington Kentucky, sent a helicopter to the Allegheny Hospital to bring her back to Lexington Kentucky.
They treated her amputated stump wound and later they helped her find a prosthetic company to assist her with fitting a prosthetic leg which she had to wear for the rest of her life.
From the accident, Cheng Chew also suffered from permanent nerve damage to her right ankle which required her to wear ankle brace for life too.
Two years after being fitted with a prosthetic leg and rehabilitations, Cheng Chew returned to St. Joseph Hospital to work full time without hesitation.
The colleagues at the St. Joseph Hospital welcomed her back with open arms.
In 1999, Cheng Chew took an early retirement from her full time job to work as a Volunteer nurse at the Diabetes Treatment Center at the St. Joseph Hospital in Lexington Kentucky.
She often was requested by the hospital nursing staffs (and sometimes by the doctors) to see potential amputee patients at the hospital, to share with them her experiences with amputation and to provide emotional support for the patients and their families.
Over her 10 years’ volunteer work at the St. Joseph Hospital in Lexington Kentucky, she saw about 800 patients.
To honor her, the St. Joseph Hospital put her picture on the cover of its first publication of the Hospital Magazine “Well Aware” as shown below here.
The Hospital also engraved her name in a brick in her honor and installed it by the side of the Founder’s Statue in front of the Hospital in Lexington Kentucky.
Antarctica and Beyond
After retirement and even after the loss of her left leg, Cheng Chew continued to explore.
She rode in the Hot Air Balloon in Istanbul in Turkey, she met with the penguins in Antarctica, she climbed the 400+ steps up to the Sun Yat-sen Mausoleum in Nang-Chin China and she also climbed the Great Wall of China.
Rooted in Gratitude
Thanks to Cheng Chew and her husband’s guidance, both of her children thrived.
Her son, a MIT graduate, helped develop Windows 95 and 96、Xbox at Microsoft, Chrome at Google, and customer engagement programs in Amazon.
Today, he runs his own AI company. Her daughter became a senior finance executive at a global firm.
More than success, Cheng's families also honored their culture and their roots.
She asked a famous Chinese artist & calligrapher to write her son's name and his family members' names and hanged them in the hallway of his home in Seattle.
In 2023, Cheng Chew took her family, (her daughter, her son and her grandson) back to Penang Malaysia to explore her family roots : to show her family the Jetty she landed in Penang Malaysia from Fuzhou China , the house she grew up in, the schools and the college she attended….etc.
My Stories, for My Children
In 2023, Cheng’s son signed a one year contract with a professional Memoir Writing Company to guide Cheng in writing her memoir “My Stories".
It was completed after a year and it was published in 2024.
Her memoir had a collection of her decades-old family photos, her hospital magazine cover with her photo on the cover, and many thank-you notes from her patients.
Reading the 600+ pages of her memoir was like watching a slow-rewinding film, from the present to the past.
Through words and photos in her book, Cheng invited her younger generations into the world she had lived : how she had survived through hardship, through unshakable strength and hope.
Where There’s Light, There’s a Way
In 2023, Cheng Chew lost her husband. For Cheng, life goes on….
Each day, she wakes up with purpose……taking care of her garden, reading, window shopping, watching TV, chatting with families and friends …etc.
When I visited her at her home in the Laguna Woods Village, she was sitting in front of the computer in her study room, carefully editing every word of “My Stories”.
“The book will be published but it will only be for families and for close friends.” she said.
“It’s for my children and grandchildren. I want them to know where we came from and to understand how we made it throughout our lives——step by step.”
I asked, “If you could go back, would you choose a different path?”
She smiled and pointed at her family photos on the wall, with steady eyes and calm voice, she said, “Looking at my children’s successful careers and happy families they have now, I would still choose the same path of my life —— to pave the way for my children’s future ……..”
Cheng Chew’s life holds no headlines, only quiet strength.
“My Stories” is more than just a memoir of Cheng Chew——it’s also the story of countless immigrant mothers in the United States of America.
Through her stories, Cheng Chew reminded us that "LOVE is An Unsinkable Ship"!