Brooklyn's Sunset Park has long been a nexus for immigrants from China's Fujian Province, who often touch down first in the neighborhood's 8th Avenue Chinatown before scattering to out-of-state Chinese restaurants to pursue their American dreams.

But Sunset Park has recently become the launchpad for a reverse migration – of infant children back to China. More and more Fujianese couples are finding it convenient to send their babies back home to be raised by grandparents, thus freeing up time for the parents to work and earn money in the United States.

Ms. Zheng, who is seven months pregnant, shares a tiny 8th Avenue apartment with two other families. Zheng, who is 24, explains that she and her husband usually work out of state in Chinese restaurants, but when she got pregnant she moved back to Sunset Park in order to have her child. "My husband's still working in Pennsylvania," she says. "Probably when I give birth he'll come back."

One of Zheng's roommates is in a similar situation – she and her husband immigrated to the United States at great expense and decided to start a family in New York City. Her husband is working out of state, and she now lives with her newborn child in one room of the Sunset Park apartment.

"They say that when the baby is three months old, they're going to send it back to China so their parents can take care of it," Zheng says. "That way both parents will have time to work jobs in the States."

It is a relatively common practice for Fujianese immigrants to send their infant children back to their hometowns in Fujian to be raised by grandparents or relatives, Zheng explains. "We all have to work; neither member of a couple has time to raise a child."

But when the children reach age 4 or 5 and return to the United States to start school, problems arise. "I hear that sometimes kids get spoiled by their grandparents, and when they come back to the States, they're impossible to control, they don't listen to their parents," says Zheng. "Some kids won't even call their parents Mom and Dad, they call them 'Aunt' and 'Uncle' instead. It's painful to hear."

"If [the grandparents] were in the States, we wouldn't need to send our kids back. It would be so wonderful to be able to watch them grow." But instead, immigrants like Zheng must give up the joy of watching their children's first steps, hearing their first words. "It's all for the best. We have to make a living," Zheng sighs.

Stories like Zheng and her roommate's are not uncommon in Sunset Park. Though some children make the transition smoothly, quickly adjusting to their new lives in America, others have a rockier time. Failing to establish warm relationships with their parents, acting out in school, and linguistic and cultural barriers all contribute to their troubles, and for young parents with no childrearing experience, relating to such children can be a challenge.

To alert parents to the problems their children may face when adjusting to life in the United States and legal issues that may arise from sending their children back to China, the World Journal held an open forum at PS 105 in Brooklyn on October 31.