Item 18 - Interview of Susan Kan

94.4 MB (1 file) : mp3 ; 0 hr., 41 min., 17 sec.

Audio recording of interview with Susan Kan conducted by Vivienne Poy in Toronto, ON. Interview conducted in English.

From Transcripts [Extended notes] compiled by Vivienne Poy:

Susan Kan (dependent - co-applicant with husband) 1968, interviewed in Toronto

• Born June 30, 1941, the youngest of 3 children from parents of an arranged marriage.
• Completed secondary school at St. Paul’s Co-ed College, and continued at Northcote Teachers Training College for 2 years. She taught visual art and English for 6 years in secondary school in Hong Kong. She then requested to be transferred to elementary school to get some primary school experience before they came to Canada. So, she taught 1 year in elementary school. She had planned to apply in 1967.
• Got married to Miki Kan, also a teacher, in July, 1965. In 1967, there were political turmoil in Hong Kong. At the same time, they would like to look into new opportunities for themselves, as well as being independent from their parents. Life in Hong Kong was too complicated, and they would like to have a simple family life.
• They wanted to apply to immigrate to Canada. They applied together, and after 1/2 year, they were asked to have the medicals. They put the reasons for immigration as exploring teaching opportunities in a new country. And beside the above reasons mentioned in the last paragraph, they also stated that both husband and wife had decided to start a new life. In the newspapers in Hong Kong, 2,000 teaching jobs in Canada were advertised. Half a year after the medicals, they were notified that they had 1 year to make their decision to make the move (1967-8). Susan quit her job, but Miki didn’t because he wanted to make sure they could cope with the life style in Canada, so he took a leave of [absence] for 1 year. Susan was sure that she would like Canada, and really didn’t want to go back to Hong Kong after leaving. In her first year in Hong Kong, she was never home sick.
• June 7, 1968, they landed in Vancouver with their daughter. It was their first time ever in Canada. From Vancouver they flew to Saskatoon where Susan’s sister was. She was in shock. She thought it would be like the James Bond movie, full of highrises, but couldn’t believe that it was all flat land. Susan stayed with her sister while Miki flew to Toronto to find a job. Within 2 weeks, he got a teaching position in Brampton. He flew to Saskatoon to pick up Susan and their 11/2 year old daughter.
• Miki had a university degree and Susan did not, and they have both taught in Hong Kong. But the Canadian system recognized Susan’s teaching diploma more so than Miki’s. He had to make up courses before he was given the job. He took them from that June and started work in September. Susan was not teaching because their daughter was too young. In 1969, when Susan looked for work again, she only needed a telephone interview. The Principal of the school mistook her as Mrs. Kent, and got a shock when he met her for the first time. She taught elementary school in Mississauga for 11 years. The system of teaching in the school changed a great deal, from closed areas to open concept, to French immersion. she took different courses to cope with the changes. She had to learn how to teach English in a French immersion school. After 11 years, she was still the most junior in priority among teachers who didn’t know French, and lost her job. But she was offered interviews in Peel county, however, she would have no choice of the location.
• Their first home was a rented townhouse. The cost was $160 / month, $50 for heating /month. With a salary of $3,000.00 a year, there was very little money left. Despite that, they still had to find a way to send money home because Miki’s parents expected it. It was very difficult for them to send $50.00 home every month, and still, the parents felt that it wasn’t enough. Among some of their family members, they still considered Canada was Gum San, and that everyone was rich. In fact, in comparison to the pay in Hong Kong, after deductions, teachers made more than in Canada. The standard of living in Canada was higher in Canada, but people had less money. But Miki’s parents had higher expectations. They were contributing to his parents in Hong Kong by paying them rent in one of their rental apartments, and Miki also had to work for free for his father every Sunday teaching art at his father’s studio.
• By 1974, every new teacher had to have a degree before they could teach. If Susan had stayed on teaching, she would not have to do that, but she wanted time off for her children, and out of ignorance, instead of taking a leave of [absence], she left. So, when she returned, she needed to have a degree. She took half a course a year, which lasted 10 years. She took the go-train to these courses at U. of T. and Erindale College. By the time she was home, it would already be 11pm. She also took summer courses. By 1978, she could afford to take a year off, her mother came to help, and her mother-in-law came to help as well. She was able to complete 10 courses. she got her degree.
• Near the time for their retirement, in their 50s, Susan and Miki found out that there was a window open, saying that in teaching, the magic number was 90 for one to retire without penalty. eg. when she was 55, if she had taught 35 years, she could retire without penalty. It would be 75% of the best five years of one’s income. Even the time she took maternity leave would have counted as a full year, and the years that she taught in the British Commonwealth would be counted if she applied. By then, the way the superannuation was calculated was different from the 1970s, and Susan only needed to pay back $10,000.00 which was worth it, and the timing was good.
• In the 1970s, she had tried to apply, but it would have cost her more than $20,000.00, in order to make up for the superannuation for the 7 years she taught in Hong Kong. At that time, they didn’t have the money. They were living in a semi-detached house. By making the application did not mean that Susan would get higher pay. Because she didn’t have a degree, there was a cap to the amount she could make anyway.
• She had no regrets coming to Canada. In Hong Kong, there was no family life at all. Everyone worked 6 days a week, and Sunday was for catching up with sleep, catching up with home work, and visiting her parents. For Miki, he had to work at his father’s studio as a monetary contribution to his parents since he was not paid. Being in Canada, there is family life, and life is more child focus. But for the first 10 years, there was no life style as such, because they couldn’t afford it. Afterwards, the first child is older and it helped.
• She wondered, when the [children] were small, whether it was worth her while to work at all, because more than half of her salary went to the baby sitter, and they also needed 2 cars because they taught at different schools, and in addition, the cost of owning and running the cars. She also needed clothes. Now, she realized it is definitely worth it, because she is retired with a pension. However, she didn’t realize that her pension could not be passed on to her children. She contributed 8 % of her income for all these years, and when both she and Miki were gone, there would be nothing for the children. Because they contributed to the superannuation, they could not contribute to RRSP. She didn’t realize this until after she retired. But they do have a good pension for their retirement, and they can live quite comfortably on one pension, so they use the money from the other for their new business venture in photography.
• Miki retired at the age of 56, and 1 year earlier than Susan.
• They came to Canada at a good time, because as time went on, it became more and more difficult to get a teaching job. There were some years that her salary was also frozen. In her last 5 years, the cut back by the provincial government had affected her retirement scale. So she felt they had retired at the wrong time.
• When Susan went first went to apply to immigrate, she didn’t feel confident that they would be accepted. She felt very lucky to be here. During that time, Canadian immigration was terribly overworked because so many people wanted to come. There were teachers who weren’t accepted. And if you had health problems, then there wasn’t a chance anyway.
• They are practicing Catholics. They don’t insist that their children go.
• They tried to send their children to Chinese school on Saturdays, but they hated it. It was a struggle.