Bill Belew has raised 2 bi-cultural kids, now 34 and 30. And he and his wife are now parenting a 3rd, Mia, who is 8.

I was born in challapalli, a village near our districts head quarters’ machilipatnam. When i was born my father and his brother used to live with their families together in that house. I was born in my Peddamma’s (father’s elder brother’s wife) hospital. The hospital is located in the ground level of our home. My father is the youngest among his 4 siblings. He loves to drive different vehicles from his child hood. He started with a bicycle and moved on to a tractor in our farm at age of 12. He enjoyed roaming the fields and poultries along with his siblings and my grand father. My grand father passed away when my father was still a child. My grand mother then raised then with a lot of fun and love. My father was very curious and intelligent. He can pick up on people by just meeting them once.

Family

Family is a very important element for my father. He always tries to look out for the family and then for the people in our village. My father later on studied in ooty for his schooling. He was well educated in English language as it was his first language. He speaks a fluent English. Despite the fact that he is well verse in literature, he chose to continue the family business. He takes care of the farms, poultry, fisheries and other businesses in our village.

I was sent to my aunt’s home, for my studies at a early age. My parents used to visit every week from our village to meet me. Later on my brother and I were joined in a boarding school for our studies, my parents visited every other week and learnt about our progress, activities and friends. On holidays, we travelled to our village to spend time as a family with our parents, grandparents and other relatives. It was like a festival every time we went home.

When one of the members in our family is sick, my dad always travels to their place to assist and give comfort. I learnt from my dad the importance of family and to consider the impact on them for every decision we make. My dad has a bad habit of smoking from a very early age growing up in our village. He got lung infection few years back. When my dad was hospitalized, I saw most of the family members and relatives visiting him and assisting him in any way possible. Family is very important, we share our enjoyment as well as sorrow with each other to light the load. We try our best to take care of each other. My father taught me a very important lesson that the family is very valuable.

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Talk to Bill and others about their experiences raising bi-cultural Japanese-American kids.