I tried wood seal carving!

 

Hold on to your space seats, because the story time U.F.O. is back at it again, zapping fresh stories straight from the mothership into your inbox! 🛸

If you’ve been following my blog or my ShachemLieuw YouTube channel for a while, you probably already know I’ve been deep-diving into learning Mandarin and exploring more about my Chinese heritage. Well, my latest mission involved signing up for a wood seal carving class, and I liked it so much that I’ve officially decided to purchase a wood seal carving kit and turn this into a permanent hobby! 🧰✍️

Fun plot twist: we didn't actually work with real wood. We got to practice on erasers! But it was still super fun learning all the traditional carving techniques. (For those wondering, the Chinese carving knife used for this is called an intou or bidao—often referred to as an iron pen or a graver!)

The class went pretty in-depth about the history of seal carving in China. Historically, seals (or chops) served as powerful credentials of identity, political authority, and social status. Back in the pre-Qin era, anyone could use the term xi for a seal, but after the First Emperor of Qin unified China, xi became exclusively reserved for the emperor, while ordinary people and officials used terms like yin or zhang. Over the centuries, seals evolved into incredible works of art used by scholars, nobles, and artists to sign paintings and official documents.

Naturally, I came to class fully prepared, but true to my style, I got a bit distracted from the given assignment. Instead of doing what I was told, I decided to carve my surname using the old Chinese spelling of Liu.

The teachers absolutely loved my carving! Some even asked me if this really was my surname. Which it is! Back in the late 18th century, my great-great-grandfather arrived in Suriname by boat from Hong Kong. According to family lore, he came with his brothers to start a business in Suriname. Because of how Chinese names and naming structures work, when he arrived, Dutch officials recorded his name as "Lieuw On"—and that’s how the Liu family officially became Lieuw On in Suriname.

According to those Dutch officials, my great-great-grandfather apparently didn’t have a first name at all, because they accidentally fused his family name and given name together. We strongly suspect his actual first name was either An or Wan. So there I was, sitting at the Confucius Institute Suriname in the Paramaribo Leysweg building centuries later, carving a name belonging to a lineage historically tied to major historical figures and imperial dynasties (like the great Liu clan of the Han Dynasty, famously associated with the dragon throne and imperial heritage), all while looking completely non-Chinese!

That’s the beauty of having a diverse history. The only visible clues of my heritage left are the name I proudly carry and the Hakka language my dad speaks. Because he was going to be the last Liu in our immediate circle to speak Chinese, it inspired me to pick up Mandarin. It's at least a start, because trying to find classes for Hakka in Suriname is tough—you can't really enroll in a formal course for that. I mostly just remember a scattering of words I picked up from the old man. 🗣️

Nevertheless, I believe my journey into exploring my ancestry has only just begun. I'm officially on a mission to find out what specific village my great-great-grandfather came from. Maybe one day, I can actually look up his name in a zupu.

For those wondering, a zupu (or jiapu) is a traditional Chinese clan genealogy book. It’s a privately compiled family tree record that preserves a clan's bloodline heritage over hundreds, sometimes thousands, of years, documenting migration histories, generational poems, biographies, and ancestral roots. Finding something like that would be awesome—it’s basically like looking back in time to find missing parts of yourself. When I look back at history and see the brave, creative, artistic, and politically savvy Lius who came before me, I finally understand which side of the family I inherited certain traits from! lol 🧬😄

Being Dogla means I carry such a wonderfully diverse heritage. If you're wondering what "Dogla" means, it's a term used locally to describe a person of mixed descent—in my case, representing a vibrant blend of cultures where my ancestors traveled from all over the world and nestled themselves right on the tropical coast of South America in a country called Suriname.

As I dig deeper into my heritage, I’m taking you right along with me on this wild ride. I hope you enjoy the vlog, so make sure to subscribe, hold onto your space seats, and stay tuned for the next chapter! 🚀🌴