Toronto mayoral candidate Olivia Chow takes part in a debate in Scarborough, Ont. on May 24.Chris Young/The Canadian Press
In the summer of 1970, a spirited girl from Hong Kong got off a plane in Toronto. Her parents had decided that their future in the British colony, then being roiled by China’s Cultural Revolution, was too uncertain.
Just 13, the girl found her life turned upside down. Back home, she was the spoiled daughter of a middle-class family with a housekeeper. Now she was a shy stranger in a new land.
Her family moved into an apartment in St. James Town, the sprawling high-rise complex that was becoming a landing pad for thousands of striving immigrants. Her mother, a teacher, was reduced to working as seamstress in a sweatshop. Her father, a school superintendent in Hong Kong, drove a cab and delivered Chinese food.
Embittered, often afflicted by paranoia, he beat the girl’s mother. The girl was forced to intervene physically to try to stop him.
At school, the girl was ashamed of her imperfect English and slid down in her seat to avoid being chosen when the teacher asked students to read aloud. To fit with the latest teenaged fashion, she made herself a pair of bell-bottoms by cutting slits in the legs of her jeans and sewing in rough denim patches.
Olivia Chow wins Toronto mayoral race as city faces housing crisis
Gradually, though, the girl began to forge a path for herself. Defying her parents, she took a summer job as a junior forest ranger in Ontario’s north, awakening a lifelong love for the vast Canadian wilderness.
She buckled down at school and earned a spot at the University of Toronto. She volunteered as a crisis counsellor at a hospital emergency department. She endured then escaped a relationship with an abusive boyfriend.
She discovered a passion for causes, like the plight of the Boat People, refugees from Vietnam’s communist regime. She started working on election campaigns. At age 28, she ran for office herself, winning a seat as a school trustee.
Nearly 40 years later, Olivia Chow is about to assume one of the most important posts in Canadian politics. It is an extraordinary moment in an extraordinary Canadian life.
Olivia Chow supporters cheer as they watch polls report results during a municipal election night event in Toronto on June 26.Chris Young/The Canadian Press
Whether she will be an extraordinary mayor of course remains to be seen. She has spent her political life in opposition, so her skill as an elected executive is untested. She comes to office with a narrow mandate, barely outpolling rival Ana Bailão in an election-night squeaker. She has been a divisive love-her-or-loathe-her figure in Toronto politics. Ontario Premier Doug Ford said she would be a “unmitigated disaster” as mayor.
Will she be able to work with Mr. Ford (or he with her) on big issues such as housing and public transit? Can she transcend her roots as a old-school progressive and forge alliances with business leaders? Can she fulfill her promise to make Toronto an affordable, safe and caring city without overburdening the city’s taxpayers?
Leading a city beset by stubborn homelessness, soaring rents and disturbing violence will not be easy, but, then, not much in her life has been.
She saw her parents separate. She saw her father assigned to a psychiatric ward. She survived thyroid cancer. She contracted a nerve disorder that hampered her ability to smile.
Then came the cruellest blow of all: the death of her husband Jack Layton. The two were inseparable, soulmates and life partners who served together at city council and on Parliament Hill. Though in public she was a dignified, composed widow, in private she was having panic attacks that set her heart pounding in her chest. Yet again, her settled world had been swept away.
She ran for mayor and lost, finishing behind John Tory and Doug Ford despite entering the campaign as a favourite. Then she failed in a bid to return to Ottawa as an MP. Her career as an elected politician appeared to be over.
Yet here she is – standing on the doorstep of the mayor’s office.
Living such a life has left her with qualities that should serve her well. Resilience. Grit. An ability to see the light amid the dark. A can-do spirit. A talent for team-building.
Not many people could have gone through all that she has and emerged so strong. Despite all her sorrows, her zest for life and love for her city shine through.
Not long after she arrived from Hong Kong, she recounts in her memoir My Journey, young Olivia decided to learn how to skate. She took the subway down to the famous rink at City Hall. She fell again and again, coming home black and blue.
Canadians skate, so she would skate. In time, she learned. Now she is set to govern Canada’s biggest city from an office overlooking that rink. The whole country should wish her well.