WHITE CHINESE.

Auckland Star, Volume LXIV, Issue 206, 1 September 1933, Page 8

WHITE CHINESE.

BORN IN AUSTRALIA. Wide interest has been aroused in Sydney by the strange case of Ernest Soong Yee, a full-blooded white man, born in New South Wales, who, in everything except birth, is Chinese. Because of hie inability to speak English, he gave evidence in a case at the Central Court through an interpreter. He was not sworn on the Bible, but took the Chinese oath. Known as the white Chinese, Soong Yee is a familiar figure at the Sydney municipal markets. He is an enigma to white men and Chinese alike." He is saving money, working and dreaming of the day when he can return to Hongkong to his Chinese wife and his daughter. Except for an odd broken word or two, he cannot speak English, and it was with difficulty that he was made to understand a question. This, however, is the strange history of the white Chinaman. So far as he could make himself understood, he was born in Quirindi, New South Wales, and as a child went to China with his father, his mother then being dead. His father died not long after arrival in China, and Ernest, cast adrift among the teeming millions of his new country, had to battle for life. He early went to work in the rice fields. "Velly hard," he says. And so he grew up among the habits -and customs of the Chinese. He learned their language, their writings, atp their food, lived as they did, and so gradually assumed their character. Soong Yee, in due course, married a Chinese girl. "She velly good, nice," he said. "Byen bye me go back."