They are as distinctive as the game they play. Almost every day, about 20 Chinese seniors sit side by side in a dark smoky basement on Arthur Street to play Mahjong – a Chinese gambling game. Tsingkim Tam, a 75-year-old widow, usually wakes up at 7 a.m. and takes a slow walk to Dundonal Park on Somerset Street. She then spends most of the morning “yum cha” (a Cantonese term that literally means drinking tea) at Chinese restaurants after her early morning exercise. Tam plays Mahjong almost every day from 11 a.m. to 5 p.m. She says she plays the game so much that she’s a “full-time worker.”
"I like to play, win or lose,’’ Tam says in Cantonese, Mandarin and sometimes English while sitting in the basement where the games take place. "It doesn’t make any difference, and the bet is very small. The reason is to kill time."
A mother of two, Tam came to Canada in 1971 from Hong Kong with her husband. They bought a number of apartments and other properties near Somerset Street and now Tam makes a living by renting the properties.
“My husband died six years ago,” says Tam, smoking a hand-rolled cigarette. “My son is in Toronto and my daughter is in Vancouver. They have one thing in common: both of them think I’m a trouble. But the good thing is I can afford myself,” she says, laughing.
Some are driven by addiction, others by boredom. Almost all those playing in the basement are Chinese over 60 who are originally from Guangdong province or Hong Kong. Most of them came to Canada in the 1960s and many worked in Chinese restaurants for their whole life and can’t speak English. Now their children have moved to other cities. Most receive a couple hundred dollars of assistance from the government every month. They have enough money to live on but a lot more time to kill.
“At my age, you will know what life is,” says Baihai Liu, 72, who thinks of his daily games of Mahjong as a sport rather than an addiction. “Happiness and leisure are life, but pain and suffering are also life – it really depends on the way you look at your life,” he says in Cantonese. “And I think I’m happy when I play Mahjong.”
For some, the social aspect of Mahjong is more important than the game itself.
“In Ottawa Chinatown, there are three places like the one on Arthur Street,” says Allan Chai, a 47-year-old grocery store owner on Somerset Street. He says he believes Chinese seniors become addicted more to the socialization than the game itself.
"It beats sitting at home and watching TV,” he says in Mandarin, embellished with some English.
“They’re at an age, they’re over 60 and they’re alone. They don’t have many relatives in town, and they can’t understand most of the TV programs. What can they do? They need a diversion, because they don’t want to disappear in the crowd,” says Chai.
Weixiong Yeung, a 65-year-old widower, agreed that loneliness is one of the main reasons that he plays Mahjong.
“I think most of us are not addicted to gambling, but (we play) because we have nothing else to do,’’ he says in Cantonese, while he shops for groceries in Chai’s store.
“It’s not like we can go to an American movie or karaoke.” Yeung has lived alone in Ottawa’s Chinatown for most of his life and says he could never survive anywhere else.
However, while it seems like many elderly people living in Chinatown lead isolated lives, some Chinese seniors are still enjoying their life.
“How can you be lonely when there’s so much to do?” says Xiaoqing Ren, 61. Ren came to Canada in 1981. Now she’s a community worker in Chinatown and also volunteers at some community newspapers. “I’m too busy to feel lonely,” she says.
“You need have an internal life, something to feel passionate about, but not just gambling. Playing Mahjong for the whole day is stupid,” says Ren in Mandarin, “I don’t know when I will die, but I don’t want to waste my time. I know there are always opportunities to feel lonely, but it really depends on your willingness to be happy.”
As darkness falls and the aroma of BBQ pork and fried rice permeates the air, the street is getting crowded with people rushing. However, the basement on Arthur Street remains the same just as it was in the morning: in the pale yellow light, about 20 Chinese seniors sit side by side, sharing the companionship that Mahjong brings.