Daughter forks out a fortune to build farmer father plush home but faces social media criticism villa designed for her, not him. Woman, who sells clothes online, insists plush 3-storey villa is a way to say ‘thank you’ to the man who raised her. — SCMP
A woman in China who spent 10 years worth of her savings on a luxurious house for her farmer father has triggered social media speculation that she only did so to burnish her own personal online brand.
The woman, who goes by the name Ziyu, is a fashion designer and used to own more than 20 clothing stores in Kunming, the capital city of Yunnan province in southern China, before she lost everything during the Covid-19 pandemic.
She told the mainland lifestyle media outlet Yitiao that she began spending everything she had saved over a 10-year period to demolish the dilapidated farmer’s house owned by her father, and build a luxury three-storey villa in its place in 2016.
The woman did not specify exactly how much money she spent on the villa, but said her savings were used up in laying the foundations alone. Ziyu added that she also spent 300,000 yuan (RM191,022) on fine-quality red bricks.
Due to an overspend, she was forced to pause the renovation in 2017 before resuming it in 2022 after getting back on her feet by selling clothes via livestreaming platforms.
Her parents lived in a nearby residential building during the construction.
“I don’t care how much I spent on it,” Ziyu told Yitiao.
Ziyu said the house is a gift for her 75-year-old farmer father who spent his life planting vegetables in Anning, a county in Yunnan.
She asked the architect, Yang Xiong, to keep three trees in the yard of the old bungalow, a big one that represents her strong and vigorous father, plus two of the persimmon variety, which were planted in the year of her birth as a symbol of her and her elder sister.
Ziyu also asked her father to make bamboo lamp shades in accordance with her design.
Ziyu said her parents live on the first floor to be close to the farmland, and she and her husband live on the third to avoid disturbing each other.
Growing up in the countryside, Ziyu said when she was young her relatives laughed at her dream of becoming a fashion designer, but said her father had always supported her.
Building the villa was her way of saying “thank you”, she said.
Ziyu added that villagers believe a family with two daughters is pitiful because after marriage they belong to another family, and this would lead to the parents facing neglect in old age. She wanted to prove them wrong.
Some social media observers were moved by Ziyu’s filial piety, while others said the house was too fancy and looked like she had it built for herself rather than her father.
“A family without sons has a daughter who built such a great house for them – it is something worth boasting about,” said a supportive commenter on Weibo.
“We need people with good aesthetics to build more beautiful houses in the countryside,” said another.
“The design of the house is quite modern, and seems more suitable for her taste and online observers rather than those of her father,” said a third person.
Ziyu said her father smiled with satisfaction each morning when he walked through the house on his way to the farmland. – South China Morning Post
