I must have had a name when I was first born, but I have no idea what it was. You see, I was born somewhere in China. I lived with my family for about six months. However, when they saw that I would never be able to walk like normal children without surgery, they abandoned me on South Hubin Street in Xiamen. So, that's the story of my first name.
On September 7, 1994 some kind person must have brought me, hungry and screaming to the orphanage. There the officials gave me a birth date and a name. I still have my birth date, but the name, Chen Qing Cheng, which means Celebrate The City, didn't last long. You can understand why my parents changed it. Chen Qing Cheng was my official name for 22 months. But, that's not what people called me.
My third name was a nick name. Everyone in the orphanage called me Xiao Didi, which means Little Younger Brother. There were about a hundred kids in my orphanage, but there were only a few males. Since the other males were severely handicapped, I was the only one that visitors were allowed to see. You can imagine that I was the center of attention among all those girls. I was Xiao Didi to everyone – especially the Nannies who loved me most.
This is the same name, Xiao Didi, that I took with me when I went to live with my American family in China. At that time my dad was managing a factory, and my mom was volunteering in the orphanage. A new director came to the orphanage and without checking with Beijing she allowed my mom and dad to take me home as a foster son – something highly unusual in those days. Luckily, neither the director nor my parents got into any trouble. During that year, my parents weren't sure they would be able to adopt me, so they just called me Xiao Didi.
Even though my older brothers were Americans, they also had Chinese names: Tian Yi which means Heavenly Justice and Tian En which means Heavenly Grace. It would only make sense that my name should match my older brothers'. My Chinese name would become Tian Ci which means Gift from Heaven. I like that a lot better than Celebrate The City!
Finally, my fifth name is the one I use now, Digory Matthew. Digory sounded a lot like Didi, so it wasn't hard to adjust to the new name. My parents liked the name Digory because it belonged to a character in The Chronicles of Narnia, who starts out poorly, but ends rather well. According to the baby book, the name Digory means "lost". My middle name, Matthew, means Gift from God, the same as my new Chinese name. This name means a lot to me because I started out lost and ended rather well. To be a part of my family now has been a gift from God.
