Joseph was born in Hong Kong and was the eldest of 8 children. He was a responsible, kind and caring person who believed in filial piety. After the age of 18, Joseph decided to take up the responsibility of helping his parents to support the family. He completed his post-secondary education at the College of Education in Hong Kong and taught primary school for nearly 30 years in the role of the Master of Discipline. He also obtained a certificate in polytechnic structural engineering from the College of Hong Kong and a bachelor's degree in sociology & social work. After immigrated to Canada in 1992, he worked for the local Chinese newspaper Sing Tao until the Parkinson’s disease stroke him to early retirement.
Joseph was happily married to his wife, Teresa for over 41 years since 1974. They had 2 children, Dominic and Agnes, and 2 granddaughters, Kristen and Lauren. Joseph loved his wife and his family and was very proud of them. Even experienced early retirement due to the Parkinson’s disease, he never gave up taking care of his family. He kept exercising his body everyday to keep up his fitness and insisting to complete household duties and cooked for the family until his body strength experienced significant deterioration after the death of his wife.
Joseph was very talented in many skills and hobbies. When he was teaching as PE (Physical Education) teacher, he was skilled in different types of sports like basketball and table-tennis. Joseph enjoyed different genres of music including Chinese, classical, and pop. Joseph also learned professional Chinese brush painting at his early age. He loved drawing so much and intentionally used drawing to fight his uncontrollable muscle movements from Parkinson’s disease.
When living at Columbus, Joseph enjoyed spending time in his room to work on his artwork and sharing with others. He utilized the books from the Vancouver Public Library outreach service to enrich and inspire his drawings. In 2019, his drawings were chosen for the Vancouver Public Library Foundation’s Christmas card. The same year, Joseph generously contributed some of his artwork to help the Christian Life Community (CLC) Canada, National Assembly raise funds. In 2023, Joseph was interviewed by the BC Catholic and was featured in an article entitled “Care home resident builds connections with his art”. Joseph had a soft spot for children, hence teaching primary school for many years, and shared his art with the visiting students from St. Anthony of Padua He encouraged them to draw and to share and/or exchange their work with each other. Joseph wished to use his artwork to fundraise for sick kids.