Lucy Margaret Chang Nyuk Ha passed away peacefully at home in her beautiful garden, surrounded by her loving family on August 24, 2023, in Ottawa, Ontario, Canada. She had just celebrated her 76th birthday.
Lucy led a remarkable life. A lifelong learner. An unparalleled gardener and botanist. A person of many talents and interests including the arts, culinary, sewing, and creative design. A bibliophile. An accidental trailblazer who touched the lives of many.
Born in Tuaran, British North Borneo (as it was then), Lucy spent her early childhood in Kuala Belait, Brunei, and then left to attend secondary education at Sabah College residential school in Kota Kinnabalu, Malaysia. After graduating from her Senior High level, she went on to secure her University Matriculation from Acton Technical College in Uxbridge, England.
Lucy continued on to pursue a university education in Canada. She is a graduate of the University of Alberta (M.A. Library and Informational Studies), Edmonton, Canada, and of Lakehead University (B.A. English and Botany), Thunder Bay, Canada.
Lucy was the first in her family to leave home for higher education and early on learned how to adapt to different cultures and climates. From England, she ventured further afield to begin her undergraduate degree at the new university in Thunder Bay, Canada. She married, moved to British Columbia, and started a family. Over the years, Lucy lived in urban and rural environments in Manitoba, Ontario, and Alberta. As a professional librarian, she rose to Head of the Government of Alberta's Environmental Protection Library (subject specialties: Environmental degradation; Climate change; Forestry, fish and wildlife; Parks and green spaces). After retirement, she pursued her passions in botany and gardening.
Lucy's lifelong interest in plants began with her family's orchid business in Borneo, was nurtured as a student at the Royal Botanical Gardens at Kew in London, England, and was recognized with the Master Gardener certification from the University of Alberta's Devonian Botanic Garden. She is a Past President of the Edmonton Horticultural Society (EHS) and former Chair of the EHS City Gardeners. Lucy was recruited into the Communities in Bloom (CIB) program and served as a provincial and national judge for almost 20 years. In that role, she travelled across Canada and mentored many new judges. She was involved in the Mediterranean Garden Society, North American Rock Garden Society, and the Royal Horticultural Society (England). Lucy presented countless horticultural talks and gardening workshops, wrote articles, and led several garden and botanical tours internationally, in particular to England, New Zealand, and Spain. She enjoyed traveling to visit and learn about different gardens around the globe, including South Africa, Pakistan, The Netherlands, Panama, Hawaii, and the United States. She also developed several of her own personal spectacular gardens, the most recent one in Ottawa.
Lucy made deep friendships wherever she went. She pulled from her depth and breadth of knowledge and experiences to connect with all range of people in all manner of environments. She valued those relationships.
Lucy was a devoted and loving spouse, mother, and Chia Poh - and everyone's favourite purveyor of high tea. She enjoyed a rousing game of Scrabble and the family effort to complete the giant Christmas crossword. She walked nature trails and brought them alive for her companions. She taught us to appreciate both the simple things and the finer things in life. She was a steady and loving force that helped us all to fly.
Lucy maintained an active and high quality of life throughout the last nine years of living with cancer. She was independent and cognitively aware until the end.
She is dearly missed by spouse Richard; daughter Juliet (Christopher); son Robert (Kailee); grandchildren Madelaine and Felix; sister Cathy (Mike pre- deceased), brothers Nyuk Hon (Soo Chen), Sylvester (Annie), and Ronald (Hee Mui), sister-in-law Weiman (Nicholas predeceased), and her nieces, nephews, grandnieces, and grandnephews, extended family, and friends. She was predeceased by her father (Richard Chang Thien Yun), mother (Rose Chong Fung Lan), and brother (Nicholas Chang Nyuk Fah).
In Ottawa, her family had a private event at the Beechwood Cemetery and a visitation in her splendid garden on September 3rd, 2023. In Edmonton, a private family interment was held at Beechmount Cemetery on Friday, September 8th, 2023, followed by a Celebration of Lucy's Life on September 9th, 2023 at the University of Alberta Botanical Garden (formerly Devonian Botanic Garden).
“As long as you have a garden you have a future; and as long as you have a future you are alive.”
“If you look the right way, you can see that the whole world is a garden.”
Frances Hodgson Burnett, The Secret Garden
Her legacy continues ...