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Starting over in an alien environment

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Chung Yeuk-lam's temporary home in Jutang stands in front of a vast green paddy field. The two-storey house in a small village in Haifeng, Guangdong, owned by her uncle, has a floor area of at least 500 square feet and is modestly decorated.

Inside, the television and telephone put the family in touch with the outside world. It is almost midnight. The eight-year-old and her two older sisters are still playing a popular cartoon card game.

Yet the scene is totally unfamiliar to Yeuk-lam.

For 4,500 yuan (about $4,200), the child and her mother were smuggled out of China when she was only three months old and have been living in Hong Kong illegally ever since.

But this week, as Yeuk-lam became the first child illegal immigrant from the mainland to be forcibly repatriated, she also returned to an unfamiliar land and siblings she had never met.

When she met Zhouxuan, 13, for the first time on Tuesday, Yeuk-lam said: 'I've seen you on television. You look the same as you appeared on screen.' (Both her sisters have recently appeared in a Hong Kong programme.) Zhouxuan, who won an award for excellent performance at school last year, was pleased to meet her sister. But she repeatedly said 'not in China'.

Although they have different personalities, the two sisters have come to know each other quickly. Zhouxuan has already promised to help her sister with her studies. For Yeuk-lam, it is her first step towards a life that is alien to her.

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