Following the increased religious interventions in China, my great grandfather had a wooden sculpture of Guan Yin who was referred to as the "Goddess of mercy" which he had moved with from Jiaxing to Hangzhou in the late 1990s.  The reason behind the sculpture was the belief that Guan Yin would take the deceased and placed them in the heart of lotus and later send them to a pure land in the west. Additionally, being a shaolin warrior, my great grandfather had great connection with Guan as she was connected with the Shaolin temple among other temples. I was too young to understand the relationship and the benefits of the scalp until he passed and we had to relocate and carried the scalp with us. My eagerness to know about it made my father teach me more about it. 

– Kai-Chun Lai

Relationship:  Great-grandchild of im/migrant or more Great-grandchild of im/migrant or more