Beer league hockey

October is normally the start of beer league season. But as there is no men's league hockey in Riyadh, I will be missing out on it this year. It has otherwise been a tradition for me the past 15 years. For someone who grew up in Canada, I was a late bloomer when it came to (ice) hockey. Coming from a poor immigrant family, sports was not a priority. Also, being from a demographic not generally associated with hockey, as well as being undersized, the stars did not naturally align to push me towards the sport. But I loved hockey anyhow, and even started my own league to play floor hockey at the gym of a local church when I was a teen, since ice hockey was out of reach. I learned to skate at age 13. I then played (pick-up) hockey occasionally -- mostly off rather than on – until I was in my thirties. My first experience with organised hockey was in Manhattan. I joined a beer league there by happenstance at age 34. Since then, I have played regularly and been on several beer league championship teams. I have been fortunate to have shared the ice with…

My first arrest

My first arrest happened when I was 16 years old in the last week of June 1991. A short time earlier, I had befriended someone from Chinatown who had connections to the triads (Chinese mafia). We got along well and came up with the idea of shoplifting and then on-selling designer clothes to them. It was not about the money; it was about winning their favour (and, for me, gaining their protection). On the day that I got arrested, my friend and I went in the afternoon to a downtown Toronto department store. I had a “booster” bag which I would use to conceal the goods. My friend was there to keep a watchful eye. All went smoothly. However, as we exited the store, we were approached by two buffed persons who identified themselves as security. I looked at my friend, panicked, and yelled “run!” I ran onto the street as fast as I could and dropped the bag, and thought that would be that. However, security continued to pursue me (allowing my friend to flee). After a chase of about 50 metres, I felt the arms of one of them grab me from behind. I fought him with all…

Toronto 25 years later

I left Toronto 25 years ago. First to pursue graduate studies in the United States. Then onto a global career that has made me a legal resident over the years of five other countries (USA, Germany, Singapore, UAE, and Saudi Arabia). In that time, I travelled to 50+ countries, got married, became a polyglot, and won (hockey) beer-league championships in three cities. I currently split my time between Riyadh (Saudi Arabia) and Abu Dhabi (UAE). My transition into a global citizen is quite remarkable considering that I had previously never travelled or left Toronto (with the exception of a few visits back to my ancestral village). But that all changed in the summer of 1999 after I had graduated from the University of Toronto. I arrived in Canada at age four. I grew up in South Riverdale. The area now goes by the name Leslieville, and is considered one of the trendier neighbourhoods of Toronto. But back when I lived there ('80s and '90s), it was an industrial working class district. My parents paid a pittance (relative to today's market) for our house back in the early 1980s. The factories of Eastern Ave and Carlaw Ave are now replaced by…

77 River Street

77 River Street in Toronto is the address of my old probation centre. I had bimonthly (twice a month) meetings there from age 16 to 18 back in the 1990s. The probation officer that was assigned to me after my second case ("PV") had recommended to the Crown that I spend six months in closed custody. PV had a bachelor's degree in criminology & psychology but held many misinformed views about me. When the judge ruled to allow me to perform community service in lieu of jail time, PV felt affronted. When I was assigned a community service officer (CSO), both PV and the CSO (who was part of PV's network) doubted my ability to complete the hours on time. I "volunteered" at a Red Cross office. The manager (who did not know that I was doing my deed as part of probation) liked my work and provided highly positive feedback of me to the CSO. I finished my hours quickly. PV did not show up for the last several meetings I was supposed to have with her. I had completed all the requirements of probation long before then, and each subsequent meeting made her eat the proverbial crow. In…

Unlikely journey towards the PhD

Twenty-five years ago, I started the most unlikely of journeys towards a PhD. My path was rather random and improbable: I was born on the streets of a third-world country to peasants; raised in poverty in Toronto; arrested twice and spent a brief time in prison as a teenager. Higher education was the last thing on my mind when I was expelled from high school. Nevertheless, I eventually managed to earn the highest academic degree -- and under a Nobel laureate supervisor. I am not supposed to be a holder of a doctorate. The PhD is, in many ways, a luxury for the well-off. The median time to acquire a PhD in economics at North American universities is about 5.5 years and with a 40 percent incompletion rate. (Median time from completion of bachelors to PhD is about 8 years, and median age at graduation is 31.) Years of forgone/reduced income and career progression is a steep price for a person trying to escape penury – especially if academia is not the goal. Moreover, insomuch as there is a thing as the opposite of a “tiger family”, that would be mine. We were part of the Cantonese immigrant underclass in…

High school sojourn

It took me six years to finish high school. I graduated at age 20. I started and finished at Riverdale Collegiate in Toronto, but in between bounced around three other schools. However, I often tell people that I went to five schools. This is because the second sojourn at Riverdale was, for all intents and purposes, a different school. Riverdale was completely torn down, with the exception of its façade, and rebuilt anew during my absence. (It stayed open and functional during that time.) I originally left Riverdale on my own volition. I would be subsequently expelled from the next school. When I tried to go back to Riverdale my ex-VP was aware of my expulsion. When I was in his office applying to get back in, he told me, “The day you get back into this school is the day I quit!” He then threw my transcripts on the floor. I was rejected by all the high schools I applied to in the following year, including at Monarch Park Collegiate – a school that enrolled 30-year-old “mature” students. (Ironically, the professor at the University of Toronto who encouraged me to pursue a PhD was a student at Monarch Park.)…

Ancestral village

I was born in Guangdong Province, China near the city of Guangzhou (previously known as Canton) in 1975. The region, which goes by the name of "Renhe" (人和) in Mandarin (Jan4wo4 in Cantonese (Jyutping transliteration)), lies only 30 minutes by car (or metro) from downtown Guangzhou. Back in the 1970s, however, the only option was a full-day’s trip by bicycle (or an infrequent local bus). Renhe has its own dialect of Cantonese. The difference in our version is mostly a “lazy” tone and pronunciation. However, we also have a rich portfolio of words (and word usages) distinct to us. When people from my village speak our dialect in the city (i.e. Guangzhou), most just assume (and somewhat correctly) that we are farmers. Or in the case of Hong Kong for me, the assumption often is that I am an overseas Chinese who speaks poorly and/or with a strong accent. At one point in my life I did speak Cantonese poorly. I left my childhood village at an early age and grew up in Toronto. For fear of not being able to learn English, my father forbade me from speaking in Chinese with my siblings. Therefore, growing up I spoke (dialect)…

Chasing a hitman

I almost shot a police officer while on probation on a sunny May afternoon in 1994. I was 19 years old at the time and no longer a minor – my probation related to an offence from when I was a young offender. The night before, I returned home late after finishing a shift waiting on tables. I saw my mother as I entered the house. She mentioned that my dad had been attacked by a Chinatown gangster called “Brother Dragon”. I checked on my dad. He was lying in bed. I walked over to look at him, but as I approached he rolled away and covered himself with the blanket and mumbled that he was fine. I went to bed exhausted, but with a sense of anger that my father had apparently been attacked. I owned an illegal handgun at the time. The next morning before going to school, I packed my gun with me with the intention to go to Chinatown later that day to find Brother Dragon. However, when my classes finished that day, I realised that I had no viable plan. Toronto’s (downtown) Chinatown is a big place. Was I supposed to barge in to every…

Losing life’s keepsakes

All my life’s meaningful physical possessions – including my high school diploma -- were contained in a shoebox when I was a young adult. Yet, I threw them all away in my early 20s in a feeling of anger and worthlessness. Growing up I had lived in the attic of my parents’ house. It was a threadbare room with just a mattress, an unusable desk and some steel shelves. I stored my clothes in a few cardboard boxes. I had little in the way of physical possessions. The few that I owned, I had accumulated in a shoebox. They included old gifts and cards from my first girlfriend, a signature from Doug Gilmour (the captain of the Toronto Maple Leafs from the 1990s), my high school diploma, and other keepsakes. I moved out to live on my own in my first year of university as a result of my parents’ house having been foreclosed. My family would eventually regain possession of our home. But as I was no longer living there, I had given permission to them to rent out my room to help with expenses. Several years later I moved back in with my family and took over a…

The Organ Grinder

I worked in services jobs from age 15 until 24. More than just making extra pocket money, I depended on these positions to support myself and my family. I was a busboy-cum-waiter at the Organ Grinder – a pizza eatery featuring a large theatre organ in Toronto (that closed in November 1996) -- from grade nine through first-year university (age 15 to 21). I bounced around five high schools and had multiple run-ins with the law as a teenager. The Organ Grinder was my anchor of stability. I grew up relatively deprived. The Organ Grinder was my window into middle-class culture. I learned to jive to the Chicken Dance and the YMCA songs to the music of the organ there. I also served thousands of birthday cakes to guests – the restaurant was a popular destination for kids’ birthday parties – even as I had never feted my own birthday. I worked many hours at the Organ Grinder, to the point that I still know the computer codes for the menu items, and I still get dreams / nightmares about working there. It was a loud and busy environment where strong bonds and lasting memories with colleagues were forged. And…