Mother Tongues, Memories, and Movement: Inside a Culturally Appropriate Program for Immigrant Seniors
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I followed the clacks of ping pong balls and board game pieces to find the church basement where Gaia Community Care and Wellness Society (Gaia Cares) runs its weekly wellness program for Chinese-speaking seniors. As I approached, the percussive ricochets were soon accompanied by the familiar syncopation of Cantonese–a language ingrained in me from a young age, yet limited to basic conversations and ordering dim sum items. On this day, I was determined to practice my Cantonese with the seniors at Gaia, while understanding that the challenge of expressing myself in another language was temporary and voluntary, but a facet of everyday life for many older immigrant adults.
Inside, participants effortlessly intercepted ping pong balls, deftly repositioned Jenga pieces without flinching, and calculated their next mahjong moves. Between rounds, they bantered about regional discrepancies in rules, often conceding to serial champions at the table. One would be surprised to learn that all Gaia Cares participants are living with dementia or post-stroke symptoms.
According to Service Director Joseph Wong, it wasn’t always this way. “Many participants were initially withdrawn and reluctant to participate,” he revealed. “But they slowly came out of their shells.” He cheered on Mrs. Yung, 90, who beamed as she leapt after ping pong balls. She would later need to be persuaded to take a break for lunch.
At lunch, the program always provides a nutritious meal of rice, soup, and a bun for dessert–reminiscent of a Hong Kong café. Hot water and tea are necessities, even on a July afternoon. “We don’t serve cold water here,”[1] Percy, the Executive Director, chuckled.
While eating, participants listen to classic Cantopop songs while eating, absorbed in melodies and memories.
“This music reminds them of their youth. Sometimes they become emotional when it brings up memories of loved ones and places,” said Joseph.
One of the songs was by Cantopop and Chinese opera diva Liza Wang, a favourite of my late grandmother’s. Later, I Googled the English translation of the chorus. The lyrics described the journeys we embark on for love. Water may be unpredictable and turbulent, but it can also be clear and calm…
For many participants, this space offers restoration from physical and mental health vulnerabilities in a society where they may not know who or how to ask for help, or are afraid of asking altogether. When Joseph found his current position after arriving in Canada nearly two years ago, he felt a calling to respond to the fragmented local services landscape and its lack of culturally appropriate and holistic support for immigrant seniors [2]. As he nears the age of 50, Joseph sometimes wonders about his own ability to “age in place” in Canada [3].
Drawing upon his work experience in rehabilitation for vulnerable children and youth, Joseph emphasises a range of structured and supervised physical, cognitive, social, self-care, recreational, and artistic activities to enhance the seniors’ memories, social connections, physical mobility, and sense of self-worth. The program also offers wraparound services such as counselling, fall prevention support, physiotherapy, and foot care.
Photo courtesy of audrey tung
Immigrant Seniors and Their Families
Gaia’s Executive Director, Percy, immigrated to Canada to ensure a secure future for his daughter amid a previous wave of political uncertainty in Hong Kong, during the region’s 1997 handover to China. His family arrived with his mother-in-law, for whom Percy became a primary caregiver. Despite the social programs available in Canada, he noticed older non-English-speaking adults fell through the cracks. He needed to accompany his mother-in-law to all social and health services. Decades later, older adult immigrants remain especially vulnerable, and their children and spouses continue to take on caregiving as the equivalent of an additional full-time job.
Social Precarity
For many of the seniors at Gaia, their journeys to and in Canada are largely characterised by precarity, a “condition in which certain populations suffer from failing social and economic networks of support and become differentially exposed to injury, violence, and death” according to Judith Butler [4]. Inequity can be inflicted overtly, as evidenced by hate crimes that targeted Asian elders during the peak of the pandemic. But more often, inequity occurs inadvertently and invisibly via the cumulative effects of social disadvantages–including inadequate access to pensions, Old Age Security benefits, social networks, and services that are appropriate to one’s culture and language [5]. These systemic disadvantages leave older adult immigrants especially vulnerable to social isolation, chronic illness, and mental health challenges [6].
Internalised shame and stigma can be compounded by cultural barriers. Percy illustrated the importance of counselling for many older adults who receive daily living assistance from largely non-Chinese speaking in-home care workers: “In Chinese culture, it may feel terrifying or demeaning to accept intimate care, such as showering, from people who are not family. Older adults may also feel deeply embarrassed about being unable to take care of themselves, especially after spending their lives raising families or building and re-building careers in their home and host countries.”
Percy further emphasised: “There’s a Chinese saying that family shame should not be shared with outsiders.” It is a phrase that I am accustomed to hearing from family members.
Many older adult immigrants leave behind financially secure lives in their home countries to reunite with or raise children and grandchildren. Oftentimes, they rely on younger family members for financial support and navigating service systems. Such dependence can lead to feelings of disempowerment that are exacerbated by intersecting, and often internalised, stigmas of illness, age, and race [7].
Percy explained that older adult immigrants may carry the unacknowledged grief of multiple losses: status in one’s family and society, sense of community and place, and the ability to navigate daily life and social services. They may feel unable to express these sentiments due to their perceived subordinated role at home and in public. Many immigrant adults are also self-conscious about their English language abilities–which become more difficult to obtain in old age and social isolation–and avoid using healthcare services altogether [8].
“In this program, we try to unlock and build upon their existing strengths,” said Percy.
Percy sometimes plays football with one of the participants, Stanley, to conjure reflexive memories of his skills and accomplishments, including his athletic prowess and postsecondary education at an American university. When verbal dialogue is difficult for participants, they connect through physical activity.
When Stanley’s wife, Helina, arrives to pick him up at the end of the program, he rushes to present her with a flower arrangement he made. Helina tells me that this is the only Chinese-language senior’s program where he feels like he is hanging out with friends instead of being attended to by caretakers. His excitement about the prospect of attending every week also cheers up Helina. “When he’s happy, I’m happy.”
At the board game table, tenuous structures buckled, leaving the rubble of Jenga and Humpty Dumpty’s Wall Game. The Humpty Dumpty figurine lays strewn among the pieces—its expression frozen in perpetual terror. The players, perhaps accustomed to precarity and gravity, giggled. “They used to be scared of these games,” remarked Joseph.
Photo courtesy of audrey tung
Caring for Caregivers
Caregiving work is often invisible, especially when it lies outside of child-rearing duties that receive a greater degree of social and political recognition. Joseph and Percy believe there are inadequate financial and emotional safety nets, including tax refunds, and support services, even though many immigrants are caught between the dual responsibilities of elder and childcare.
It's important to Percy that Gaia’s program also supports caregivers who feel alone in their experience. Beyond providing relief from caregiving duties, the program also offers counselling for caregivers and includes them in activities.
I met David and Pauline, as Percy nestled fresh flowers into a jar of multi-coloured water beads. Staff and volunteers had encouraged David to gift the bouquet to his wife. Pauline and David grinned at each other like teenagers, blushing pink as the petals before them.
Pauline tells me that the program has provided weekly respite from worrying about David’s wellbeing. Their daughter Anne explains, “With my Dad’s cognitive impairment and chronic disease, his weekly activities were limited without the constant care and support for my mom.” When David is at Gaia, Pauline appreciates the autonomy to leave the house and run errands or spend time with him at the program. The program has provided David the opportunity to connect with others, as well as aspects of himself, like his love of ping pong.
Pauline adds, “He was very athletic when he was younger. He loved to play soccer and basketball on top of ping pong.”
“I’m getting old now,” David said with a chuckle.
“That’s why you’re training up again,” she replied.
As one of the only Cantonese-language day programs offered in Greater Vancouver, Anne describes Gaia’s services as “a revelation for [her] family.”
She emphasises, “Everything from the lunch offering to the carefully selected activities is tailored for clients. I’ve seen firsthand the remarkable difference the program has already made for my father – physically, emotionally, and mentally.”
Program Precarity
Despite Canada’s growing population of aging immigrants, there are still persistent gaps in services, policies, and representation. These gaps can further widen as existing services struggle to keep up with demand. Gaia’s day program is the only Chinese-language wellness support group in Burnaby, a municipality where nearly 30% of residents speak Chinese as a mother tongue [9].
As an older adult himself, Percy feels uncertain about his capacity to sustain the day program. He personally covers the cost of rent for the space in the absence of secure institutional funding, but he vows to keep the program running as long as he can: “If we close, many participants and caregivers will have nowhere else to go. I worry about them.”
The day program would not be possible without the weekly volunteers who prepare fresh meals on-site, guide participants through activities, and help them to reconnect with the social world. Sandy, a volunteer who is a stroke survivor herself, says, “Many participants who are reserved at first become animated when you reach out to them. Everyone here carries a story. I’m here to listen.” More information about Gaia and how to support them can be found on their website: https://gccws.ca/get_involved/.
[1] Consuming hot water in all seasons is a custom in Chinese culture, largely owing to traditional Chinese medicine health principles.
[2] Stewart, Miriam, et al. “Challenges and barriers to services for immigrant seniors in Canada: ‘You are among others but you feel alone.’” International Journal of Migration, Health and Social Care, vol. 7, no. 1, 2011, pp. 16-32, http://dx.doi.org/10.1108/17479891111176278.
[3] “Aging in place” refers to one’s ability to remain in one’s home or community safely, comfortably, and independently. It is held as an ideal for healthy aging: more here.
[4] Butler, Judith. Frames of War: When Is Life Grievable? Verso, 2009, pp. 25.
[5] Kobayashi, Karen, and Mushira Mohsin Khan. (2020). “Precarity, Migration and Ageing.” Precarity and Ageing: Understanding Insecurity and Risk in Later Life, edited by Amanda Grenier, Chris Phillipson, and Richard A. Settersten Jr., Bristol University Press, 2020, pp. 115-146, doi:10.46692/9781447340874.00
[6] Employment and Social Development Canada. “Social isolation of seniors: A Focus on New Immigrant and Refugee Seniors in Canada.” Government of Canada, 2018, https://www.canada.ca/en/employment-social-development/corporate/seniors/forum/social-isolation-immigrant-refugee.html#h2.5.
[7] Kobayashi, Karen, and Mushira Mohsin Khan.
[8] Lin, Shen Lamson. “Access to health care among racialised immigrants to Canada in later life: a theoretical and empirical synthesis.” Ageing & Society, vol. 42, no. 8, 2022, pp. 1735-1759, https://www.cambridge.org/core/journals/ageing-and-society/article/abs/access-to-health-care-among-racialised-immigrants-to-canada-in-later-life-a-theoretical-and-empirical-synthesis/9ED5F24F0444793E25785E5E2B65BA2B.
[9] “Census Profile, 2021 Census of Population.” Statistics Canada, 2021. https://www12.statcan.gc.ca/census-recensement/2021/dp-pd/prof/details/page.cfm?Lang=E&SearchText=Burnaby&GENDERlist=1&STATISTIClist=1&DGUIDlist=2021A00055915025&HEADERlist=0
Audrey Tung (she/her) lives on the unceded territories of the Musqueam, Tsleil-Waututh and Squamish Nations, and works in the unceded territories of the Lekwungen (Esquimalt and Songhees) and W̱SÁNEĆ peoples. She is a PhD candidate in the department of geography at the University of Victoria, where she serves as a researcher on a community-based study entitled “Solutions to Health and Housing for Older Women.” Her research areas have included homelessness and housing insecurity, health equity, and food insecurity. She has contributed articles to The Homeless Hub, The Conversation, and The Tyee.
Hazel Yuhang Zhang (she/her) is a Vancouver based interdisciplinary artist whose research focuses on the intersection between the environment, community, and the formation of personal identity. Zhang finished her Bachelor of Fine Arts degree in the visual arts program at the University of British Columbia. Her work has been exhibited in venues like the Hatch Art Gallery and Gallery Gachet in Vancouver, BC, Canada. Follow her work on Instagram (@hazelzhangyh).
