Chinese Migrant Cooks for Sick Neighbor, Melts Hearts in Canada

By Bridget O'Donnell

An essay published on a Canadian newspaper's website is going viral due to its heartfelt message on human nature.

The Globe & Mail essay, titled 'My neighbour doesn’t speak English, but her kindness needs no translation,' is written by Angie Morris, an 81-year-old woman who grew up in the United Kingdom and now resides in Vancouver. Morris details her daily interactions with her neighbor, a 68-year-old Chinese immigrant who watches after her grandson while her daughter Nicole is away in Shanghai.

The neighbor, who Morris refers to as 'Wing,' regularly brings over home-cooked meals, including soup, rice, vegetables, meat, seafood and a special "kind of pancake." Morris calls it "the ultimate home-delivery service."

After Nicole informed her mother that Morris had to undergo heart surgery, Wing decided to begin cooking for her despite communication barriers. Wing doesn't speak any English and Morris only knows how to say "hello" in Chinese. Sometimes Nicole will act as their translator from abroad, Morris writes:

Once, [Wing] brought an iPad as well as the food. She pointed to the screen, which displayed a message from her daughter telling me that her mother wanted to know if the food was all right and was anxious to know that it wasn’t too salty for me. I am not used to iPads and was unable to find the keypad, so the lady indicated I should go with her to her house. Once there, she handed the iPad to her husband and almost immediately I found myself looking at Nicole in Shanghai and discussing her mother’s cooking and the fact I have to be careful about my salt intake.

Wing and Morris have apparently even attempted to begin using a hand gesture system to communicate that the food containers are empty, unfortunately without any success. When Morris stopped by to drop some off, Wing became overly concerned:

I think she believes I am too fragile to be making this effort, so despite my attempts to dispel this notion, she insisted on holding me firmly by the arm and escorting me right to my own front door. I was quite concerned about this because I tend to tower over her, and if I were to fall I think I would bring her down with me.

Morris writes that she eventually was able to find out more details about Wing from a renter who speaks Chinese. She learns that Wing survived the Cultural Revolution and was forced to work in the fields instead of attending university. She reflects:

So here we are, two grandmothers a world away from where we were raised, neither of us able to speak the other’s language but communicating one way or another (with some help from technology). The doorbell keeps ringing and there is the familiar brown paper carrier bag, handed smilingly to me by Wing.

The essay has resonated with readers in Canada, and particularly in Vancouver, which is experiencing skyrocketing real estate prices. The rising prices are often attributed to an influx in foreign buyers, many from Mainland China, though some experts have disputed this notion. In any case, the rising prices have led to heightened racial and class tensions in the city, with Morris noting in her essay that “madness... has gripped the Vancouver housing market.”

The essay's simple message on the human connection has helped it go viral on Western social media sites. In China, one netizen had this to say about the piece on Weibo: "Mutual help among neighbors is the traditional virtue of China. The Chinese woman has made a good kind of example, across the country!"

[Image via ais3n on Flickr]

You May Also Like...

For more China news, click "Read more" below.