They were shivering in shock, huddled under blankets in a local evacuation center when Kiki Wolfeld found them.
It had been hours since their disgruntled coworker had gunned down seven others who worked at Half Moon Bay’s mushroom farms. Yingze Wang and her husband, Jinsheng Liu, were among the small group of Chinese farmworkers who had somehow survived the rampage that cool January afternoon.
They were trying to comprehend what had happened and where they would go next, but no one there spoke Mandarin to explain — until Wolfeld with the nonprofit Senior Coastsiders arrived.
“Everything will be OK,” Wolfeld, a China-born former social worker, reassured them.
The nonprofit founded four decades ago had hired her just months earlier to reach out to Half Moon Bay’s elderly, largely isolated Chinese community to join the organization’s English classes and exercise and meal programs. It already had drawn in about 50 Chinese seniors, many living in a low-income housing complex on south Main Street.
But the tragedy on the mushroom farms last winter revealed another hidden pocket of people, living in squalid conditions there. Even emergency crews and city officials scrambling to assist that day were shocked to learn that the farms didn’t just employ Latino farmworkers but elderly Chinese as well.
Wang and Liu, both 68, were among them. Over the past year, as the couple moved from one temporary living situation to the next and worked to recover from trauma, Wolfeld and Senior Coastsiders have remained a constant at their side. When they needed a place to stay for a week when their new housing wasn’t ready, Wolfeld offered them her own home. When Liu continued to struggle with post-traumatic stress, she signed him up for weekly therapy. He shares his fears with Wolfeld, too.
“He likes me to calm him down,” she said. “He was frustrated and had temper tantrums because of the shooting. He said that I helped him to open his mind. He’s giving me lots of credit!”
A donation to The Mercury News’ Wish Book would help fund the program and help pay off a $100,000 shuttle bus with a wheelchair lift that takes the group twice a month to the only Chinese market for miles in Foster City.
“This group of people who previously had been unheard and unseen — now we can just unlock all of the potential that they have,” said Sandra Winter, Senior Coastsiders executive director.
On a recent fall day, after a shuttle trip to the market where they returned with dragonfruit and tofu and other Chinese staples, dozens of seniors from all ethnic backgrounds gathered at round tables in the non-profit’s community room for lunch.
Mei Zhao [, 92, has lived in the senior housing complex that surrounds the Senior Coastsiders center for 19 years, but neither she nor her Chinese neighbors joined the center’s activities until Wolfeld was hired.
“She became a bridge to the community and the world,” Mei said of Wolfeld. “Now, my life feels more meaningful.”
Guangli Yang, 87, is grateful, too. Wolfeld helped her acquire an electric wheelchair.
“I am so happy being here. Whenever I have a difficult time, people always help me,” said Yang, showing off some of her new English skills.
When she spotted Miriam Champion, a volunteer serving hamburgers who also meets with Yang for one-on-one English language practice, Yang blurted out, “You are my teacher!”
“No. You are my friend,” said Champion, drawing Yang in for a hug.
It’s a welcoming attitude that permeates Senior Coastsiders and one that has been transformational for Yingze Wang. For six years, she and her husband lived in a tiny, damp shelter inside a mushroom greenhouse on Concord Farms that aggravated her arthritis and caused a chronic, irritating rash on her husband’s skin.
During a January storm, the couple stepped out of bed and into knee-high waters. They had no wifi, no internet, no TVs. Now after spending the past year immersed in programs at Senior Coastsiders, which serves a wide range of older adults taking everything from watercolor to Zumba classes, Wang said she finally feels a sense of belonging.
“My life before was like hell, like living in a jail,” Wang said, with Wolfeld translating. “It was so dark. Now the sun is shining. I’m living like a human, not an animal.”
After the Jan. 23 shooting exposed the inhumane living conditions at the mushroom farms, state and local agencies swept in, issuing violations to the farms and providing emergency housing and temporary funding and other services for the survivors. The alleged shooter, forklift operator Chunli Zhao, 66, is charged with killing four workers at California Terra Garden where he lived and worked, then three more at Concord Farms where he had worked seven years earlier. He is being held in San Mateo County jail without bail.
Senior Coastsiders has continued to play a role in the recovery, especially for Wang and Liu, who grew up in rural China. They always heard that America was “heaven.” More than six years ago, they immigrated, qualified for green cards and initially lived with a Bay Area relative. When that relative urged them to move out, they found work at the mushroom farm where they earned $15 an hour and lived inside the greenhouse.
The couple kept telling each other, Wang said, that “it was better than being homeless.”
The tight living quarters made for some clashes among coworkers, but they never expected a former employee to return with a gun. Wang heard the shots first, but her husband was first to come upon the bodies. When he reached out to help the man lying on the floor, Liu’s hand plunged into a pool of blood. He realized then that the couple with whom they shared a kitchen, along with a farm manager, were dead.
Liu said he has felt cursed ever since.
“I cannot sleep at night,” Liu said, with Wolfeld translating. “I have nightmares and very often wake up at midnight.”
Ongoing depression makes it difficult for him to appreciate, as Wang does, how much better their lives are now.
“Without Kiki, we probably wouldn’t survive,” Wang said.
Wolfeld also signed up Liu for an iPad training class, and he often sits with different groups in the dining room for lunch.
And finally, after months of invitations, he joined Wolfeld’s choir, where she teaches the group Chinese tunes as well as American classics such as “You are My Sunshine” and “The Star Spangled Banner.”
Step by step, he is working to put the past behind him and find joy in the now.
On a bright autumn morning, Liu walked into the music room with his wife at his side. They made their way through their group of new friends and took seats in the front row. And together, they sang.
THE WISH BOOK SERIES
Wish Book is a 501(c)(3) nonprofit organization operated by The Mercury News. Since 1983, Wish Book has been producing series of stories during the holiday season that highlight the wishes of those in need and invite readers to help fulfill them.
WISH
Donations will help Senior Coastsiders fund the program, and help pay off a $100,000 shuttle bus with a wheelchair lift that takes the group twice a month to the only Chinese market for miles in Foster City. Goal: $24,000
HOW TO GIVE
Donate at wishbook.mercurynews.com/donate or mail in this form.
ONLINE EXTRA
Read other Wish Book stories, view photos and video at wishbook.mercurynews.com.