Saturday, 30 January

Twenty-fifth day of the twelth lunar month

Jieping told me Lord Hartley, the British representative, proposed at the Pacific Ocean Conference clauses that put our country in a disadvantageous position. These included how to help Japan after the war, maintaining Japanese rights in our Manchuria, and Taiwan should not be returned to China. Even though the proposal has been vetoed by the United States’ representative, we can see how harsh the British Government’s policy towards us is, so our diplomatic future is very worrying. I told Sun Fo about this, and he thought so. He only said that diplomacy with the Soviet Union is very difficult to manage, and he said Gu Weijun (顧維鈞)[1] was not very optimistic either.

At noon, Mai Naideng (麥乃登) and his wife invited me to lunch at the Guomin restaurant. They thought Fanny should remain in Dushiqiao because Sun Fo had instructed Wu Shangying to send her a monthly subsidy. As for the house, Sun Fo had instructed Committee Members Yang Gongda and Zhang Fengjiu, 張鳳九to rent the house to me under their names.

At 7.00 Section Chief Junsu (陳君素) and Section Chief Chen Yuru (陳玉如), Section Chief Qu Chunbo (瞿純伯) and Xu Nianzeng (許念曾) and Xu Jizhan (徐季占) invited me to a farewell dinner.

In the evening Kitty quarrelled violently with me because of Zhaoxian’s words. She is as quarrelsome as her mother.[2] Kitty asked me to reserve more income for her. She said if it were not for her brother, Wu Chaoshu (伍朝樞)[3], I would not have my current status, and she hated her mother for raising her age by two years. She said she was just forty-six years old. When I chose my wife the only consideration was appearance, I didn’t take education or morality into account, and didn’t take advice from friends either. (Zhou Xinian (周希年) and Chen Jingfu (陳敬甫) had tried hard to persuade me not to marry her, and my mother was against this marriage too. This lifelong pain is my own fault. What could I say? The only thing I can do is to tolerate.

Today is the anniversary of my father’s death and the most painful day in my life.

[1] Gu Weijun (1888-1985) studied at Columbia University. He was the best-known Chinese diplomat in the world. He died in the United States in 1985.

[2] The second wife of Sir Kai Ho Kai(1859-1914).

[3] Wu Chaoshu (1887-1934) was a famous Chinese diplomat and law expert, and the son of Wu Tingfang (1842-1922). Both Wu Chaoshu and Fu Bingchang married the daughters of Sir Kai Ho Kai.