Scattered 11 Family Members Reunited in Xian, Luoyang

"We want to reunite in China. We haven't seen each other in a long time."

I was organizing materials for a standard three-day Xi'an tour when I received Lim's email last spring. Her request was unique. She wanted to arrange a cultural journey through China that could be enjoyed by a 70-year-old and 11-year-old twins, while also accommodating other family members flying in from Malaysia, the U.S., and Singapore.

I stared at the number "11 people" for a long time before deleting the standard itinerary template I had just finished.

From 70 years old down to 11, it would require a lot of thought.

Reunion for 11 in China

The most difficult part of a family trip this size isn't the choice of attractions, but the management of the pace. The elders can't walk long distances, the children can't sit through long lectures, the middle-aged adults want to take photos, and the teenagers want a social outlet.

We finally decided on a circular route from Xi'an to Luoyang and back. This minimized the fatigue of moving from one place to another, and the distinct characters of the two ancient capitals complemented each other perfectly—Xi'an was profound and weighty, while Luoyang was dynamic and vibrant.

Our first day ran into an unexpected issue with the airport pickup. The entire group was scheduled to arrive at 3 p.m., but the Kuala Lumpur flight was delayed, and the elders who had transferred through Los Angeles arrived early. I spent forty minutes with the grandfather in an airport coffee shop. It was then I learned he had attended a Chinese school in Taiwan when he was young and had always dreamed of seeing Mount Hua and the Forest of Stone Steles. This discovery was an unexpected gift that allowed me to adjust our tour's focus.

Later, at the Forest of Stone Steles Museum, the guide made sure to show them the Confucian texts from the Kaicheng Stone Classics that the grandfather was familiar with. As he traced the characters with a trembling finger through the glass, his son quietly recorded the moment on video.

The Terracotta Warriors tour was scheduled for the next morning. While most tour groups spend two hours, I set aside four hours for this family. I contacted Mr. Xu, a heritage craftsman I knew, who set up a workspace for us in the museum’s cultural products area. He prepared two kinds of clay: traditional yellow clay with simplified molds for the elders and colorful soft clay with reference pictures of aliens and robots for the children.

Surprisingly, the most invested was Lim's husband, a Silicon Valley engineer. He meticulously studied the armor plates and molded a warrior that ended up wearing a Star Trek emblem. Finally, they arranged all their creations together for a family photo. The grandfather's scholar official figure and his grandson's space warrior stood side by side, creating a wonderful harmony.

The highlight of the Luoyang trip was the Longmen Grottoes. Keeping the elders' stamina in mind, I designed a "water-based Buddha viewing" route, renting a shaded boat on the Yi River. As the boat reached the perfect viewing angle, the captain thoughtfully turned off the engine. The ten-minute silence that followed was deeply moving. The youngest twins lay on the boat's bow, counting the Buddha statues. The middle-aged couple held the elders' arms, pointing out the subtle patterns on the Bodhisattvas' robes. The two college-aged girls sketched in their notebooks. As they disembarked, the grandfather suddenly chanted a Buddhist phrase in Hokkien. Though his children and grandchildren didn't understand him, they all waited quietly.

There was no collective activity planned for the last day, but Lim messaged me asking if I could find a place for the whole family to cook a meal together. I contacted the owner of a homestay I knew, who cleared out her kitchen and prepared three kinds of dumpling fillings.

The scene that afternoon was even more heartwarming than I had imagined. The cousin from Malaysia taught the American-born children how to make Nyonya-style curry dumplings. The elders sat in the courtyard, picking chives, and the two teenage boys transported the finished dumplings from the kitchen to the stove, moving with the efficiency of a well-oiled assembly line. The homestay owner later told me in a whisper that they had brought their own family recipe and even the flour from Kuala Lumpur.

When I received the photo of them all in traditional Chinese attire, I noticed an interesting detail: the elders and children were wearing formal, classical robes, while the middle-aged generation had mixed and matched Tang-style blouses and Ming-style jackets. This unconscious choice in attire was fascinating—just like their trip, it had both a clear sense of history and room for personal expression.

Lim later told me that the framed photo now hangs on their living room wall in Kuala Lumpur, perfectly fitting all eleven of them.