From neighbors to elderly ladies in the street, everyone in China seems obsessed with not letting a child cry. At meal time, they tell me, you shouldn't let him cry because crying will hurt his digestive systems. Right after a meal, they tell me, you shouldn't let him cry because he will throw up. Before sleep time, you shouldn't let him cry because he will have nightmares. As you can imagine, disciplining our children is very difficult in China, because the grandparents and nannies would rather give in to our children's unreasonable demands than letting them cry.

Our son thus quickly learned that crying was his best weapon for getting his way. Unfortunately for him, Bryan and I were determined to hold our ground as parents, even if it meant letting our son cry.

A few weeks ago, Bryan took Landon, our son, to a train store to watch the electric trains go around on the tracks. Before entering the store, they made a pact that they were only there to watch and would not buy anything, since our son already had many toy trains at home. Once in the shop, however, Landon insisted that Daddy buy a train set for him. Bryan said "No." Landon started to whine; and whining quickly turned into crying. A Chinese couple in their forties came over and spoke to Landon, saying "Don't cry, don't cry. Tell your Daddy to buy you a train." Having found his supporters, Landon started crying even louder, demanding that he have a new train. Then the Chinese lady said to Bryan in Chinese, "Just buy him an inexpensive train."

Bryan got so upset that he turned to the woman and said, "He is my son. I am NOT buying him ANYTHING!" The woman scurried away. But her husband smiled at Bryan, gave him a thumbs-up, and said, "You are tough! Good for you!"

(selected from 101 Stories for Foreigners to Understand Chinese People by Yi S. Ellis and Bryan D. Ellis, published by China Intercontinental Press in 2012)