<An article for leading discussion on 8th, November, 2011
Asian week.com
Thursday, July 8, 1999 * Volume 20, No. 45
The Perils of ‘Parachute Kids’
By Cathy Lee and Associated Press
Imagine being 21 years old, having unlimited access to money from your parents, driving a BMW M3 and living in the suburban Northgate community of Walnut Creek, Calif.
Amy, who wishes to remain anonymous, is from Hong Kong. Her parents sent her at age 9 to live with her aunt to attend an all-girls’ Catholic middle school in Chicago. She then went to a public high school in Chicago and decided to attend St. Mary’s College in Moraga, Calif., to major in business.
Yang said she considered her schoolmates as her family.
“Boarding school was better than living with my parents, but the food was gross,” she said.
Amy is an example of what authorities call “parachute kids” -- children of rich Asian families sent to live in U.S. suburbs known for good schools and safe streets. Typically, mothers try to split their time between their husbands in Asia and their children in America, often leaving housekeepers in their stead. Parents may feel guilty about spending too little time with their kids and shower them with money and gifts, says May To, executive director of the Asian Youth Center, which has dealt with parachute kids.
“My parents bought a house in Walnut Creek because they didn’t like staying in the hotels when they came to visit their friends, so I stayed there ever since,” said Amy.
Amy said she is glad she left Hong Kong because her parents want her to marry for money.
“My parents will disown me and cut me off from the family if I marry outside my class,” she said. “They don’t know I have a boyfriend. We have been going out for almost three years and he’s Vietnamese.”
Amy said her mother comes to visit her every three months for two weeks and she sees her father during Christmas break.
She said that when she graduates from St. Mary’s College, her parents have given her two options: she can either work for her father in Hong Kong or marry in her class.
“My parents don’t know I have no intentions to return to Hong Kong,” she said. “I plan on staying here in California. I like the freedom I have living in the states -- and people are more understanding.”
Still, such freedom can leave parachute kids distinctly vulnerable to their own immaturity -- drinking, drugs, gambling, gangs. In the worst case, they are kidnapped.
Kuan Nan “Johnny” Chen lived virtually alone, a latchkey kid with a lot of money and dangerously little supervision.
His father shuttled between their home in the upscale suburb of San Marino and his native Taiwan, where the wealthy developer has business interests. His mother often flew overseas to visit her husband, leaving only a housekeeper with the 17-year-old.
On Dec. 15, Chen, a high school student, pulled his car into his driveway, parked and stepped outside.
He was jumped as he got out, bound and gagged, then stuffed into a waiting car. His abductors called his father demanding a $1.5 million ransom as they kept Johnny chained inside a safe house. FBI agents and local police -- with cooperation from police in China and Taiwan -- followed an intricate trail of clues to rescue the boy 19 days later.
“Like any 16-, 17-year-old with a nice car, money in their pocket and time on their hands, they get into trouble,” says Sgt. William Howell of the Los Angeles County Sheriff Department’s Asian crimes and intelligence unit.
The first wave of parachute kids came in the early 1980s, as tens of thousands of ethnic Chinese streamed into Southern California after U.S. immigration requirements loosened. They began settling in and around the San Gabriel Valley, a cultural hub for Asians that has grown into a bustling jumble of strip malls, condominiums and restaurants.
Many were teenagers who left behind merciless academic competition in Taiwan, where performance on entrance exams determines placement in the best high schools and universities. Some also came to avoid military service, which is required for males 20 to 22 years old. California authorities have no estimates of their numbers.
The scene is similar in Canada, where thousands of youths have been sent from Taiwan, Japan, Hong Kong and other Asian areas to Vancouver, British Columbia, to finish their education.
An estimated 5,000 “visa students” now live in the Vancouver area, said Vancouver police Staff Sgt. Andy Nimmo. As a member of British Columbia’s Coordinated Law Enforcement Unit, he has investigated Asian organized crime for the past 11 years.
The excesses are familiar to Howell: spacious homes, gardeners, servants, bottomless bank accounts, credit cards.
“In the crimes we’ve been investigating, they’re upper-middle class,” Howell said. “It’s not uncommon to see them in a BMW or Mercedes, with more money in their pocket than any of us ever have.”
But many parachute kids are reluctant to talk about their wealth, reticent about the attention their money brings.
“Even their peers will take advantage or just hang out with them because they have money to spend,” To says.
Usually, Howell said, people hear about a teenager’s wealth from the victim’s friend, relative or other associate.
This happened in the Chen case. His kidnappers were tipped off about the family’s wealth by a secretary at his father’s San Marino office, the FBI said. They spent nearly a month observing his home before taking him captive. In a delicately timed operation, the FBI and police rescued the boy just minutes after his father paid a $500,000 ransom -- negotiated down from the original $1.5 million demand -- to conspirators in China.
The boy tried to escape from a Los Angeles suburb safehouse a day after his abduction, but his kidnappers caught and punished him by hitting him three times in the head with a hammer, the FBI said.
Six Chinese nationals were taken into custody, including two who face life prison terms after pleading guilty to federal hostage-taking charges April 16. They were scheduled to be sentenced Aug. 23.
The fates of four other suspects arrested by police in China were unknown, but authorities there pledged to prosecute them, said Thom Mrozek, spokesman for the U.S. attorney’s office in Los Angeles.
Two other suspects under federal indictment, including the scheme’s alleged mastermind, remain at large.
The kidnappings go largely unreported, and authorities have no reliable statistics on their frequency. Howell estimates that just 10 percent of such abductions are reported in Los Angeles County -- despite immigrants’ growing trust in police.
Often, families fear reprisals from their attackers and feel police can provide only so much protection.
“I thought there was something wrong with them because I was used to people wanting to point out people who harm them. It took me two years to get used to it,” Nimmo said. “I understand now.”
Question
What is advantage and disadvantage of studying abroad at an early age?
Why do you think studying abroad at a young age is becoming more and more popular in Korea?
If you have a kid, would you let a kid go abroad for studying? Why?