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Tsin Van

CA

Photographer - Ottawa, Ontario, Canada Born in semi-feudal China over 92 years ago, Tsin Van has experienced enough of the world to fill several careers. "Van" as he is known by his friends, left Shanghai after university for a posting with the Bank of China in faraway Burma. But when Japan invaded Burma, he returned to China to work in the company head office in Chungking. In November 1944 he accepted an offer to study in the USA at the University of Pennsylvania. From Chungking he made his way to Calcutta, and then on to Bombay. After a short tour of India, Van boarded a freighter for USA, taking 40 days to make the voyage via Indian Ocean and the Atlantic, often in a convoy under warship protection. Shortly after finishing his studies, he received a call from the Chinese Government Supply Agency in Ottawa inviting him to assist in shipping Ca-nadian second hand war supplies to China. Van arrived in Ottawa ("a village‖, he smiles) in 1946 and quickly got to work. The job didn't last too long, but during his first years in Ottawa, he acquired 3 important assets - his wife Betty, good connections in the small Chinese community, and a reputation as a talented amateur photographer. As a foreigner with-out status just after the end of World War II, jobs were hard to find in Ottawa – even one with an MBA from a prestigious US university. But it was his talent as a photographer that became his new source of living. Van quickly became one of Ottawa‘s best known freelance photographers, snapping shots of many important figures, such as Queen Elisabeth, King Hussein of Jordan, Prime Ministers Diefenbaker & Pearson and visiting Chinese PM Zhao Ziyang in1984. Van was one of the founding members of the CCFS (Ottawa Branch) when it was established in 1976, and his long standing contacts in the Ottawa Chinese community helped establish that fledgling organisation. During the 1980‘s, he played a key role in several CCFS trips to China which brought influential Canadians to visit China for the first time. In 1998, he was awarded an Honor-ary lifetime membership in the CCFS. In 2006, the Chinese Association for Friendship with Foreign Peoples honoured Tsin Van by naming him a Friendship Ambassador in a cere-mony in Wuhan China

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