s
teenagers, John and Grace Chiang had never slept in on weekends.
Every Saturday morning at 7 a.m., their father, Alex Chiang, would
sing hymns at the top of his voice in the kitchen to wake them and
his wife, Sunny. If no one stirred after 10 minutes, he would walk
into each bedroom to perform.
"We would say, 'Get out, Dad,' and he would only try to sing
louder and louder until we got up," John said. "I complained about
it all the time. Now I miss it."
Alex Chiang, 51, and his family traveled from their home in New
City, N.Y., to Franklin Park, N.J., every Saturday to meet with
other members of the nondenominational church that he helped found
more than a decade ago. The Chiangs would stay the night with others
and return home on Sunday evening. "He's a very faithful person,"
his wife said.
Mr. Chiang, a computer specialist at Marsh & McLennan,
treated other church members with such kindness, said Paul Du, a
close friend, that more than 1,200 people came to his memorial
service in October.
After John Chiang, 22, moved into a sparsely furnished Manhattan
apartment as a young banker, he seldom visited his parents. "So on
Labor Day weekend, my dad enticed me home by promising that he would
bring me to Ikea," John said. "We bought a lot of heavy stuff. He
dropped me off in my apartment, and then he was gone." That was the
last he saw of his father. Now John has moved back in with his
mother.
