前几天，跟二哥孙溪谈起“网上孙家”建设问题，我提及他写过的文章《孙家事》作为一种回顾与反思，作为一种对家事的再认识，放上来挺有意义（这篇短文曾通过E-mail发给了各位），二哥当下表示“可以呀，你就帮我放上去好了！” 我自然要遵命了。经再次征求他的意见，他讲：不做修改了，原汁原味好。下面，即是2011年8月3日(星期三) 下午3:24孙溪用E-mail发给各位的《孙家事》原文。

孙家事

（孙溪）

各位孙家兄弟姐妹和孩子们：

家世谁知

 长期以来，咱们孙家有一种现象，就是大家都不谈家世，爸爸妈妈不谈，子女之间怕谈，讳莫如深。因为按当时的看法，咱们家庭出身不好，爸妈怕谈了孩子们有负担、影响进步（但爸爸自己却在给组织的思想汇报中大谈，并因此受罪），子女们怕问了增加思想负担。历次政治运动和文革把家里的气氛弄得很紧张，使父母和子女的关系在一些方面很畸形。我们做子女的每个人入党、入团、升学、进步不都是搞得心惊肉跳，七上八下！对家庭出身大家真有点“谈虎色变”。因此直到现在，我们孙家子女和孩子们对自己的家世知道很少，或基本不知道。多年来，家庭出身成了我们每个人沉重的思想包袱。虽经改革开放多年，一些思想禁锢还没有打开。

渐入“家”境

 现在爸妈已经去世多年了，我们的爷爷奶奶就更不用说了，爷爷谁都没见过。爷爷家兄弟三人，爷爷是老大，爷爷又三个儿子（爸爸是老二），都已经不在世了。我们再不努力，我们的家世就永远是个谜，我们的子女就更没法搞清了。搞清自己的家世，认祖归宗，是我们的责任，是我们的夙愿，也是必须向我们子女交代完成的任务。多亏孙李、孙军和孙奚的努力，特别是孙军的工作，挽救了许多几乎流失的记忆和资料，也和二爷爷、二奶奶及三爷爷的儿子（我们的叔叔）建立了联系，使我们得以慢慢拼凑起家族和家庭脉络。孙军还访谈了爸爸的许多老同事、老领导，得到许多爸爸过去的珍贵资料。现在这项工作孙军还在做。大家在孙家网站上看得到。孙李在国外搞的网上孙家很有创意，这是孙家子女交流、展现活动、可世代传承的信息平台，我们的后代可通过这个平台了解孙家、了解我们，一脉相承。这需要我们大家共同的努力。

爷奶合墓

 经军、武、李弟和我四人商议，并与三奶奶和五叔、功叔（均是三爷爷的儿子）及英叔（二爷爷的儿子）沟通，并得到老辈们的一致赞同，我们决定在北京为咱们的爷爷奶奶修建墓穴，把奶奶从孤苦伶仃的东北农村接回北京老家，与爷爷合葬。爷爷的尸骨早已找不到了，也没有留下任何照片和遗物，只好用民间通常的办法使他与奶奶合寝。经过反复考虑和几个兄弟间商量，我代表大家已经在北京温泉墓园为咱们的爷爷奶奶买好了墓地。选择温泉墓园，是因为二爷爷和三爷爷的墓地也在这里，三兄弟可以在温泉墓园这里相聚，我们也可以把这儿看作是孙家的祖地。我觉得从此开始，我们应理直气壮地讲家史、忆父母、追思先辈。这样我们才能勇敢面对现实、无愧子孙。现在一切准备就绪，只等选适当日子去吉林舒兰接回奶奶。经名师指点，又孙军认为秋收后处在老百姓农田中的奶奶坟墓才可露出，便于不扰民操作，故初定于今年十一国庆前后我与军、武弟去舒兰起坟火化后，将奶奶骨灰护送回京，与爷爷纸牌一起合葬于温泉墓园。

时间安排

无独有偶，儿子孙小桥上周回家告我准备十一结婚，诉说准备事项等。我觉得这是一个机会，可先白后红，把事情办了。不知大家如何安排，当然我与军、武弟还要仔细商量一下。小桥也会直接给大家去信。

请小莹一定把这封信给爸爸看或读给他听，请侯斌一定把这封信给妈妈看，给你妈妈的信我从来发不过去。不知笑笑和乐乐的邮箱对不对，孙李看一下。

(孙李为孙笑笑和孙乐乐的翻译)

Dear brothers, sister and our beloved children:

Family background 

Over the past years, we did not like to talk about our family and its history among ourselves. Our parents had seldom talked to us about the family history either. We were afraid to talk about our history because we believed the more you knew about it the more troubles you would get into. Nevertheless, our father had never tried to hide anything from his supervisory leaders controlled by the Communist Party in his work place. He reported to the party leaders everything he knew about himself and his family. His honesty, however, did not get any better treatment from the government or from the party. Instead, he had been crowned by many different anti-revolutionary titles in each revolutionary movement (political campaign). Our mother did not want to add extra confusion and trouble to the children because of the ‘bad family background’, so she told us little.

(People with bad family background, as it was called during the Cultural Revolution, refers to those people who owned their own properties at the time when Communist Party took over the country in 1949. The properties could be a manufactory in a city, a piece of land in a countryside, a rental property etc. If someone ever served for KMT, it would be even worse. Our family used to have rental properties in Beijing).

During the Cultural Revolution the family atmosphere was tense and the relationship between parents and children was abnormal in some respects. No one in this family had ever gone through an easy process when they applied for a job, applied to a college, or even more eager to be a member of the Communist Party or the Youth League. Despite years of reform and the opening up of the county, some ​​imprisonment has not been released.

So now, we all have our own family but we know little about our family history.

Getting into the “home” territory 

Now our parents have passed away many years, not to mention our grandparents. Talking about our early generations, we have never seen our grandfather and his two younger brothers. Our grandfather had three sons and our father was the second and they are all no longer alive. That’s all we knew until our recent family search. Our family background will remain a mystery if we do not start our work today. Our children and grandchildren would have no clue of where they were from forever.

To fulfill our responsibility, our first step is to Ren Zu Gui Zong – to find out about our grandparents. This is in our wish list for a long time.

(Our grandmother lived with us for a number of years but we had little information about our grandfather, for example we don’t know his birth date and the date when he passed away.)

Thanks to Sun Li, Sun Jun and Sun Xi’s efforts, especially the work of Sun Jun, who collected many nearly lost memories and a lot of valuable data. We are greatly thankful to our grandaunt 3 and our uncles (who are still living in Beijing) – Wu-shu, Gong-shu (sons of our granduncle 3) and Ying-shu (son of granduncle 2), through whom we have finally established a link to the family tree. Little by little and piece by piece, we gradually put all collected information and data together and the picture of the family becomes clearer than ever. Sun Jun has also interviewed many of our father’s old colleagues and friends. Many of them provided valuable information. Sun Jun still continues his research to compile more information together for the family. Sun Li created a website ‘Family Sun on the Net’ which contains information about the development of our efforts during the course. The website will eventually becomes our research library for the family. Everyone is encourage to contribute. The information will be passed from generation to generation on this platform so our future generations can understand what this family has gone through during these many turbulent events in the history This requires all our efforts today.

Combining graves

Jun, Wu, Li and I discussed and communicated with grandaunt 3, Wu-shu, Gong-shu and Ying-shu, and we all believed that we need to find a piece of land to build a tomb for our grandparents in Beijing. Our lonely grandmother has been buried in a rural northeast for many years. Grandpa’s remaining has never been found and he did not leave any photographs and belongings. After so many times of discussions and considerations, we all agreed that we need to combine grandmother’s tomb to one that belongs to our grandfather. The ideal place has been Beijing Spa Cemetery which is the place where our granduncle 2 and granduncle 3 are buried. After many months on the waiting list, we have purchased a grave land in Beijing Spa Cemetery and the place fits our grandparents perfectly in order with their other two brothers. From now on it should be the ancestral land for our family. We should be proud of our family and our family history. Now everything is ready and we are waiting for an appropriate day to go back to Jilin Shulan where our grandmother is buried. As a teacher’s guidance, as well as a concern from Sun Jun for the harvest season in Northeast, we will have our trip to the Northeast in the fall.

Timing 

Coincidentally, my son (Xiaoqiao) told me last week that he is ready to have his wedding. I think this is an opportunity to have the white and red ceremonies celebrated together. We don’t have the exact arrangement yet, but I think it is better to let everyone know so we can all make our own plans accordingly. Sun Xiaoqiao will send his own announcement to everyone in a later date.

Xiaoying,  please make sure to read this letter to you father, and Hou Bin please make sure your mother will receive this letter as well (for some reason the emails that I sent to your mother get bounced back many times). Sun Li please translate this letter to Rosy and George.