Although we are able to speak in Mandarin to each other, often it was difficult for me to understand this resident’s form of communication as she has an accent. Nevertheless, I learned a lot about this resident and her interests. During one of our calls, she shared about how much she missed the good old days back in China. She felt nostalgic about the past where everyone had the time to visit family members and have family gatherings often, especially during Chinese New Year. I also learned she loves music and still has many old traditional Chinese songs memorized. She even sang for me once. One time she sang this one song that had the lyrics saying that in life, only one’s mother is the best of all. That one song always made me emotional, reminding me that eventually we all will part from our mothers, but I wish to never part from mine and remain with her as long as I can. This song made this resident emotional as well as she continued sharing how there remains only a few members in her family besides her current family members including her grandchildren. This was a nice moment to share these emotional thoughts and reflections with this resident. 

I’ve been having calls with Mr. Teh Ou who unfortunately doesn’t have the best hearing. To get around that barrier, I had to type out Chinese characters and share my Word doc screen to communicate. Despite this limitation, the call was still productive. During our first couple sessions, I remember learning more about this resident. I learned that I couldn’t just ask open-ended questions. I mostly had to come up with more concrete questions that wouldn’t require long answers as this resident was rather soft spoken and couldn’t respond fully with longer sentences. I also learned that we both enjoy sports and this resident specifically loves ping-pong. He reminisced his youthful days when he had the strength to continue playing ping-pong with friends. It was also interesting to learn the similarities between this resident’s interests in certain activities and the activities done by my family members such as jump rope and interest in home-cooking as opposed to restaurant outings that most people do often today relative to the past. 

Working with Virtual Park Bench has allowed me to reconnect with my cultural heritage as well as an opportunity to volunteer virtually in a time where nursing homes need the most help connecting with their patients. I remember my first conversation with J, who was elated to see me. In our first time together, she relayed to me the details of her family, and how she had not been able to speak with them for a while. She was surprised to connect with someone much younger than her that also spoke her native tongue, Cantonese, and we bonded over the fact that many of our Cantonese conversations had either been in familial settings, or in settings where we needed it, such as ordering in a restaurant. We both rarely used it to socialize, but now we saw it as one of our biggest bonding tools.

To me, being able to converse with others in their native language was both cathartic and inspiring. It made me want to become a better translator and advocate for those that I spoke to, and to better my own linguistic abilities in order to provide better possible healthcare to them. In time, J and I have grown closer, expanding our conversations to our favorite foods, as well as her past travel experiences. I know that our conversations have benefited us both during this time of need, and I look forward to getting to know her better through all online video chats and activities.

Through my time volunteering for Virtual Park Bench, I had the opportunity to meet M, a senior resident from Tennessee. Right off the bat, M was very open, sharing all sorts of interesting aspects about her life: from her experiences living in many different states, to her exploits in a variety of different art practices. M’s resourcefulness is always remarkable to me and she seems to produce an endless stream of profitable ideas. I enjoy listening to her in depth plans to open up a salon and potentially teach art classes within her own nursing home. We have a great time joking around, that is whenever we’re not discussing more serious topics, such as the importance of family values and the place that religion holds in our lives. M and I both share a penchant for taking afternoon naps and a strong taste for fried fish. It’s always nice having the chance to chat with her, even if she doesn’t remember our discussion from the previous week!

During my time at Virtual Park Bench, I was able to have conversations with S at Arbol Residences in Santa Rosa, CA. We were able to share our backgrounds and experiences. S worked as a medical receptionist and was happy to see more women entering the medical field. Throughout our conversations, S expressed an interest in learning about other cultures and traveling, two hobbies we share in common. She lived in California for most of her life and wanted to travel to Asia someday. I told her about my experiences growing up as an Asian American and about different cultural practices (e.g. dining, art, festivals) in Asian countries. Overall, it’s been a pleasure to listen to her stories each week.