Imagine growing up in a foreign country while your parents lived and worked on the other side of the ocean. That was the reality for generations of children from Taiwan, Hong Kong, and elsewhere living in Canada in the 1970s and ’80s. Now, the story of one such “astronaut child” is being told in a new book.
“I think I had to write the book ultimately for my younger self,” said Wiley Wei-Chiun Ho, author of The Astronaut Children of Dunbar Street: A Memoir.
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The North Vancouver-based writer was the youngest of five children and came to Canada at the age of nine. Three years later, her parents — a doctor and a hospital administrator — went back to Taiwan, leaving her brother, the eldest child, in charge.
“We didn’t talk about what was happening. There was no term for it in the ’80s when I was growing up,” Ho said.
“There was just this deep silence about what was going on.”
The initial plan was for the seven of them to start a new life here. But then the plan changed.
“I think with so many immigrant families that come from professional backgrounds, they find it so difficult to have their qualifications recognized in Canada. And certainly, something like medicine, it was very, very difficult for my father,” she said.
“He was told he had to go back to medical school, essentially, even though he had 20 years of practicing Western medicine under his belt.”
The Astronaut Children of Dunbar Street is a story about family, betrayal, and redemption, one that no doubt will speak to many Lower Mainland readers who grew up the same way.
“When my parents left, I was pretty resentful and pretty angry and upset and all those natural things. But I didn’t understand this part of it. I couldn’t have.”
So-called “astronaut families” like hers became increasingly common as Asian parents left their children behind in Canada to keep them safe. Then, as now, there were fears that Taiwan would be the target of invasion by China.
In Ho’s case, her family was reacting to the Carter White House revising its “one China” policy in 1979 to recognize mainland China instead of Taiwan, as part of U.S. efforts to reestablish diplomatic relations with the communist regime. Implicit in that recognition was the admission that Taiwan was a part of China and not an independent state.
“My parents really feared that this meant the stability of Taiwan was going to be in great jeopardy. My brother was turning 16 at the time, and he would have been conscripted for sure had there been war. And so, they were really worried. And they thought, ‘We have to get our kids to safety.’”
The term “astronaut family” was coined by the anthropologist Aihwa Ong in 1999 to describe families from Taiwan, Hong Kong, and elsewhere where one or both parents work in Asia while their kids grow up in a foreign country.
Ho felt very much like she was living between two worlds.
“I came to Canada as a nine-year-old, but I still feel very attached to Taiwan and my first culture and my first languages. And of course, I’ve been here the majority of my life now, but I still feel this pull.”
The Astronaut Children of Dunbar Street explores that dichotomy in all its seriousness, but with heart and humour too.
“It’s a serious topic but [we] astronaut kids got up to some serious shenanigans as well,” she said.
Without giving too much away, Ho takes the reader on a journey back to 1980s Vancouver, namechecking Expo86, A&B Sound, and Duran Duran, for example.
Ho’s sense of abandonment and betrayal would take years to get over. At one point in her teen years, she even developed an eating disorder. Now, as a parent herself, she has more perspective on what her mother and father were trying to do.
“I cannot imagine, you know, at midlife uprooting your whole family, sacrificing your community, your friends, and a great career to pack it all up and go to a foreign place where you barely understand the language.”
“So, do I have a lot of sympathy? Yes. And I have so much more admiration for them now.”
Wiley has this advice for anyone feeling “lost in space” as she once did:
“I would say dispense with the shame. We can’t feel ashamed of the situations that we find ourselves in.”
As for her parents, Wiley’s feelings of resentment have been replaced with gratitude.
“The first generation thinks about survival, the latter ones get to write about it. And I feel very fortunate that I get to write about it.”
The Astronaut Children of Dunbar Street: A Memoir is published by Douglas & McIntyre.