Kang Ying sitting between her parents Liu Chengying and Wang Mingqing, surrounded by her entire family. Image: Screengrab from video of Cover News

A missing child is every parent’s worst nightmare, and for Chinese couple Wang Mingqing and wife Liu Chengying of Sichuan province, it took 24 painful years to be finally reunited with their daughter.

Kang Ying was only less than three years old when she disappeared in 1994, according to a report by Chinese news platform Cover News yesterday, April 3. The young Kang, now 27 years old and married, apparently wandered off while her parents were manning their fruit stall at the Jiuyan Bridge in Chengdu.

Kang’s parents looked for her everywhere, a desperate search that took half of their lifetime, as they did not falter in their hopes of someday finding their daughter.

Kang, on the other hand, was adopted by a single man near the village of Ziyang. Although her adoptive father died when she was 10, his family still continued caring for her despite the many gossips about her in the village.

“My childhood is very happy,” Kang was quoted in the report. She also firmly believes that she was not kidnapped.

It was in 2015 when her father, Wang, started giving out tracing cards to thousands of passengers as he worked as a taxi driver. It was during that time when he asked his passengers to spread the word around. It didnt take long until news reports picked up their story and police officers learned of their plight.

Police officers sketched pictures of an adult Kang through the use of her child photos. As these were released to the public, they caught Kang’s attention, who always knew she was adopted. She felt that she may be the daughter in question.

Kang reached out to her parents two weeks ago, and underwent a DNA testing last Sunday, April 1; it was confirmed by the test results that she was indeed the missing child. Yesterday, Kang, her husband and their children flew to Chengdu for the 20-year-late reunion.

“The whole world says I don’t have a mother,” said Kang. “[But] I have!” Cody Cepeda/JB

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