Chance Photo Request Reunites Family Across Strait After More Than 70 Years

A chance encounter at Lugu Lake has reunited two branches of a family separated for more than 70 years, after a tourist from Taiwan asked a man from Zhejiang to help take a photo, People's Daily reported yesterday.

On July 9, Chen Jie, son of Chen Yutang, was waiting for sunrise by Lugu Lake in Yunnan Province when another tourist approached and asked him to take a picture. The two chatted afterward and added each other on WeChat so Chen could send over the photo.

When Chen saw the other man's WeChat name, Fei Haiping, he felt there might be a connection. The man said his ancestral home was Puyuan in Tongxiang, Zhejiang, that he lived in Kaohsiung, Taiwan, and that his surname was Fei. Chen thought the details matched what his family knew about relatives in Taiwan.

Chen messaged his father in Jiaxing, Zhejiang, and learned that the long-lost relative in Taiwan was named Fei Yunfeng. He then asked Fei Haiping whether his father was Fei Yunfeng. Fei replied that his father was indeed Fei Yunfeng.

The exchange reconnected the two families. Chen Yutang's grandfather, Chen Alin, and Fei Haiping's father, Fei Yunfeng, were brothers from Puyuan. After their parents died early, Chen Alin was adopted by the Chen family and changed his surname, while Fei Yunfeng later went to Taiwan in 1949 and settled in Kaohsiung.

In the late 1980s, Fei Yunfeng returned to the mainland as one of the first groups of Taiwan compatriots seeking relatives and found his younger brother Chen Alin. He brought back a family photo from Taiwan with each family member carefully identified.

For years, the families stayed in touch by letter. Chen Alin could not read or write, so his eldest son Chen Yutang wrote on his behalf. The letters carried ordinary but lasting concerns: reminders to smoke and drink less, take care of his health, use money sent from home when needed and encourage younger relatives to live steadily.

The contact later faded after Fei Yunfeng's health declined and he entered a care facility. Calls went unanswered and letters stopped arriving. The Chen family believed the family tie had been broken after hearing of Fei's death. In Taiwan, Fei Haiping knew only from old letters and photos left by his father that he still had relatives on the mainland.

On August 14, Fei Haiping and Chen Yutang, both 71, met for the first time in Puyuan, Tongxiang. The family gathered without ceremony, sitting together to look through yellowed letters and talk about daily life.

The reunion, set in motion by a single photo request, restored a family connection across the Taiwan Strait after more than seven decades.