Grandmothers’ child care was/is loving and permissive. Infants and small children are caressed and fed on demand, and fall asleep in their grandmothers’ arms. They are seldom punished. Until recently they wore split pants, which took much of the drudgery out of child care: no nappies/diapers had to be changed – the child was simply held out over a suitable place.

The amount of child care given by grandmothers, always generous, has increased with time. From the start of the Mao Era young women have been expected to work outside the home. Some small children go to nurseries, and some are cared for by nannies, but the majority are cared for by their grandmothers, all day, all week, even for months on end. There is implicit trust that gradmothers are capable of this care, even the best people to give it.

The one huge exception to loving child care was that, until the early Republic (1911 on), grandmothers supervised the cruel binding of granddaughters’ feet. The practice, once considered necessary for a girl to make a good match, has long since been outlawed.