Kai L. Chan

My mum worked at the Dylex factory at 233 Carlaw Avenue in the 1980s.

I stumbled upon this rice cooker on the streets of St.

As I sat with my wife on the stone bench in front of my childhood home in the village of Aawu (鴉湖村), an elderly lady walked by us and without pausing asked if I was the boy from that house who left nearly fifty years ago.

When I was a child in Maaubou, I caught shrimps from the village pond and carried home fish when it was drained for harvest.

The most vivid memories of my childhood in China are those sharing food with my grandfather.

As I sat with my wife on the stone bench in front of my childhood home in the village of 𝐴𝑎𝑤𝑢 (鸦湖 = “Crow Lake”), an elderly lady walked by us and without pausing asked if I was the boy from that house who left nearly fifty years ago.

The Jamaican beef patty is a Toronto staple food.

Back in the early 1990s, I used to frequent a coffee shop in East Toronto which was a popular hangout for troublemaker teens.

My mum used to collect vegetables tossed in the dumpster of a wholesale produce warehouse near our home.

My father built the Hsin Kuang chain of restaurants in Toronto.

I was a Distinguished Fellow at INSEAD (Innovation & Policy Initiative) at the Abu Dhabi campus from 2015-19.