Mei-ling was good at keeping promises.
Life in Chinatown after 1923 was not easy, but Mei-ling and her father chose to stay and continue to work hard in the hope that some day their dream of reuniting their family would be fulfilled. Mei-ling did indeed go to high school, as did Ivor. They never became friends, but Ivor never again teased and persecuted Mei. Bess left school as soon as she could, and she and Mei drifted apart.
The relationship Mei-ling had established with Miss MacDonald became more important to her, with Miss MacDonald becoming in some ways the mother she missed so much. It was with Miss MacDonald’s encouragement and the help of her church, which Mei-ling attended regularly, that Mei-ling was able to take up a scholarship to study medicine at the University of Toronto — something that was not possible at that time in her home province of British Columbia. Upon qualifying as a doctor in 1935, Mei-ling went as a medical missionary to China. For one brief period, she and Miss MacDonald worked alongside each other until ill health forced Miss MacDonald to give up her dream of working in China.
Mei-ling and her father always kept in touch with her mother and Sing-wah, either through friends such as Wong Bak, who returned to China for good in 1928, or through letters. It was this that allowed Mei-ling to arrange for them to visit her on her arrival in Kwangtung in 1935.
The Japanese invasion of China in 1935, and the subsequent war, led to great turmoil in China. Mei-ling came back to Canada in 1939, fearing that she would be trapped in China if she did not. She settled in Toronto to practise medicine. Her father and Tsung Sook joined her there and set up another restaurant, like the one they had previously owned, although this time it was Mei-ling’s father who did most of the cooking. Tsung Sook had gone home to China in 1928 — the same year Wong Bak returned to stay — and married. The restaurant that he continued to run on his return to Vancouver in 1930 enabled him to send money to his wife and the son she bore him.
During the Second World War, communication with China became increasingly difficult. For a period of five years Mei and her father heard nothing from her mother, and did not know where she and Sing-wah were or, indeed, if they were alive. In 1946 they got word from Hong Kong, where Mei’s brother, now twenty-six and married with small children of his own, had found work in a factory.
Mei-ling never gave up hope that the family would be reunited in Canada. At the expense of having much of a personal life, she put her considerable energy and determination into working with other Chinese people to change the hated law which did not allow Chinese to bring their families here. When the act was repealed in 1947 it appeared that her dream would finally be realized; but even then her patience was tested, for although her mother came in January of 1949, it took much longer to bring her brother and his family to Canada. The whole family was finally reunited in 1953. They had five years together before Mei’s father died at the age of seventy-one.
Mei’s brother, having spent most of his life working on the family land, and speaking little English, did not find it easy to adapt to life in Canada. But he worked with his father in the restaurant, taking over his share on his father’s death. His dream was that his children, and their children in turn, would gain an education and make lives for themselves in Canada, just as his sister Mei-ling had done.
Mei-ling did not marry until quite late in her life, since her main goal was to ensure that the family was settled in Canada and financially secure. She married a fellow doctor in 1959, when she was forty-nine. Having no children of her own, she was a devoted and much-loved aunt to all her nieces and nephews, encouraging them and helping them achieve their dreams.
Mei-ling never lost the habit of keeping a diary. Her diaries became family treasures after her death in 1988, when they passed to her great-niece Elly Chin. Elly followed her aunt’s example in many ways. One of those was becoming a doctor. Another was keeping her own diary. Here is an extract from one of Elly’s diaries:
It was so cold today, even though the sun was shining. I was really worried about Grandfather. He is getting so frail now, and standing around in the cemetery was not the best thing for his cough. He wouldn’t listen to me, though, just laughed when I suggested that he stay at home. He teases me that ever since I qualified as a doctor, I think I know everything, but I know he is proud of me and doesn’t really mean it. He’s never missed Ching Ming, not since Great-Aunt Mei died. He says that it is the least we can do, on this day of remembering our ancestors. For the first time though, he was not the one to clear the twigs and leaves from her grave — that fell to my father and his sisters.
Grandfather stood nodding, holding my arm. His eyes were wet with tears, and his voice raspy as he turned to me and said, “You know your Great-Aunt Mei came and found me in China, don’t you? Gave my mother and me such hope that we would come here? Always honour her, Elly.” He gripped my hand hard. “Promise me you will. She worked so hard and gave up so much to bring us all together.”
I couldn’t speak for crying, but I squeezed his hand back and nodded.