By Eliza Billingham

In March 1971, when Cynthia Wong flew from Hong Kong to Boston and arrived in the  South End, the only person she recognized was her husband.

Was she daunted?

“I thought I’d give it a try,” she says.

This has always been the attitude of Cynthia Wong, BCNC’s Human Resources Manager, who is retiring from working at BCNC after more than 36 years. Her curiosity, diligence, patience, and compassion has helped shape a supportive community out of a city that was at first only lonely and strange.

In 1985, she started in the front office at BCNC, moved to accounting, then developed the entire human resources department herself.

“It was new, I had no models, and I learned everything from doing the job,” Cynthia says.

Few have been more dedicated than Cynthia. Over 80 paychecks go out every two weeks, and each one is processed by the same one-woman HR department. But Cynthia has never felt the burden was too great.

“Burn out happens occasionally with every job,” Cynthia says, “but it disappears very fast because of your love for the community.”

Cynthia wants everyone to know where they belong and how they can help. It was important to Cynthia that her children volunteer in various BCNC programs. Eventually her son, Jeffery Wong, served for three years as the chair of BCNC’s board of directors. Her children then brought their children to the childcare programs, seven of Cynthia’s eight grandchildren grew up in BCNC programs.

This month, Cynthia Wong retires after almost four decades of dedicated service to BCNC and Asian and new immigrant families. Her contributions have been invaluable to us as an organization and as individuals. We are thrilled she finally has the chance to organize her enormous stamp collection books and toy with the idea of writing her own book to share with the younger generation where their community came from.

Thank you, Cynthia, for your steadfast support and inexhaustible compassion. Thank you for creating a community for all of us to share.